Citizen 1,235,824

Sixty-nine years ago today, my father was born somewhere in Liverpool, England during the middle of World War II. His father was somewhere in Italy and his mother was left alone. He was an only child, though a sister would be born ten years later. I wasn't able to go and see him and my mother today. Frankly, I'd sort of blanked out that Memorial Day and his birthday coincided this year. Instead, I took a day to work around the house and basically relax. It had been a long time since I'd had two days off in a row. But, I was wrong not to try to go and see him. My dad is a very important person and perhaps the biggest influence on who I am today. I grew up idolizing him and wanting to be him. I think I've learned a lot of lessons about self-reliance and self-confidence from him. He and my mother moved over to the United States when they were in their early 20's. They first moved to Canada, but went south because my dad was lured by the prospect of big roads a

Working at a slow pace has its advantages. I'm typing this while making an hourly wage at Court Square Tavern , and I'm tinkering on my website, the Charlottesville Podcasting Network . There are only seven customers in here, and I have a feeling that may be about it. It's a holiday weekend, and the last weekend of the month. I've not really marked the occasion of my site's fifth anniversary. In good news, this week I did meet with the folks behind Secretly Y'all and am now hosting podcasts of their stories.  That is much more in line with the reasons for creating the site way back in 2005. I wanted to create a community resource. And, that's what the site has become, even though I've put very little effort into it since joining Charlottesville Tomorrow . That's where my energy goes these days, and I so rarely do anything to maintain the site. Yet, the audio keeps getting posted, and I'm hoping I'll be inspired my new friends to create so

I need a plan. I find myself saying this a lot now, which is odd, because up until this point I've more or less winged it. This was not necessarily the best way to lead my life, and certainly left me prone to being blindsided from time to time, sometimes with disastrous results. I did not mean to start this whole running thing, and these days there's a war of sorts inside myself as sloth and ambition seem to be campaigning for the time that has gone to running for the past year and a half. I must make sure they don't win. These days, I pretty much just get there and run when I can. I don't have a particular race lined up for the fall, but I need to select one now and begin seriously training for it. My number one goal this year is to run at least one marathon, preferably under four hours. Last night, I ran 11 miles in under 90 minutes, so I may be on track for that still. My fitness is pretty high, and I am getting much better about knowing how to regulate my b

Tonight, there is a pink sheet and a beige sheet covering the fledgling plants in my garden. I've slowly been transferring the tomato and squash  seedlings to a patch of ground out behind my house. The weather forecast is for frost and I don't want all of my work to go to waste. My kitchen table is occupied with eggplant seedlings that finally graduated from starter tray to container this afternoon. I have completed the first round of my garden. The end of that transition was celebrated yesterday afternoon when Katie made me a cappicola and tomato sandwich with my basil from my own garden. I harvested about ten pieces, and none of the plants seem worse for the experience. Gardening appears to be the running of 2010. Last year, I transformed myself by learning how to run, and I'm still learning what I need to do to get better. This year, I'm enjoying the challenge of exploring solitude by paying close attention to little creatures that I chose to bring into th