Trotting fast

Ben Franklin said something about a person not getting up early causes them to trot fast - I guess I'm trotting fast. At least when I'm not tripping over myself.

What's new?

1. We have a water shortage in our area of South Florida. There are fires in the area. Our skies are filled with smoke today. We all have watering schedules .

"Even if Florida receives average rainfall this summer, that won’t be enough to break the drought if the wet months are followed by unseasonably dry weather. In the last 18 months, South Florida has received just 49.31 inches of rain, almost 17 inches less than the 30-year average of expected rainfall."

We need rain. Hopefully, we won't get it in the form of a hurricane. But, this is South Florida, so you never know.

My brother in law works for the company that acquired the contract to fix Lake Okeechobee, the "liquid heart" of South Florida.

All I know is, the weather seems to be crazy everywhere.

2. Jacob ( three year old nephew) is officially PT. (Potty Trained.) He was 3 last October. And for three straight weeks, he's shown us he has it under control.

It took a unified effort on all fronts. A command decision came from the top that there were no more Pull-Ups. He was told this - and oh my, it seemed to be the thing that worked. He is the one who delivered this information to me, regarding the pull ups being 'no more', and his face was just very concerned about the situation.

In the meantime, I had been not making a big deal out of anything. Kind of a don't ask, don't tell, kind of a situation. I'd put him in a pull up at the beginning of the day, and then just turn him back in, at the end of day -- with the same pull up. Sometimes it was wet, but a lot of the times it was dry. And he was with me for 5 hours.

But here's the thing that gave him away. Gave him away that he was, indeed very much in control all on his own. Last March 30th I went to a concert with my brother and sister in law. As we were sharing a bite to eat before the concert, I told them a story of what their son had done earlier that day.

I'll make it short here, but he had been scolded by me for his actions regarding wasting some food in a careless way. I told him I was not happy with what he had done. He immediately said, "I have to go pee pee." H ran to the potty, sat and pee-peed, (I was right behind him by now), threw out his arms opened wide and declared with a very big smile -- "Are you happy now???"

His mother and I were convinced at that point that, yes, this child had it very much under (his own) control.

And it looks like at this point he has made the decision. It's all old hat to him now. Like he discovered the concept, like it was his own idea. Quite funny, the human being.

3. More later. I'm late, as always. Oh - I am going to try something as an effort to get things done and work on the positive side of being positive. I'm making a list of thirty things I want to do - and doing one each day. (It'll probably take me 30 days to make the list). The challenge of this list is - that if you put something on the list like - oh say, 'don't lie' - that you will find yourself faced with many opportunities to lie. And if you say, 'don't yell', or anything like that - there will come before you, these situations to challenge your conquest!

Kind of like my theory about buying a Honda. Once you buy a Honda, you notice all the Hondas on the road.

So then peace to you all today ---if you wish to experience peace, you must extend peace to others. Make your surroundings peaceful.

A peace above all earthly dignities, A still and quiet conscience.
~ William Shakespeare