How to Talk to Your Kids About Money.

Man I just love reading the news. I especially like it when I find an article that confirms something I've been thinking. Yeah that might speak to my internal biases, but still... in February I wrote a post about being open with your kids about money matters then this morning I'm scouring the headlines and I find this NPR article on teaching kids about money.

Basically the article confirms that when parents openly discuss money matters with their children, the kids grow into adults that make better choices. Woo! The kids can learn and we have scientific proof.

Ok, ok... great huh? But as I came to the bottom of the story I came down from my validation drunk and noticed a problem. From the article:

Why Do We Celebrate Heartless Heroes, and What Does That Teach Our Kids?

Got your beach balls and bathing suits? It's Memorial Day weekend! So starts the the blockbuster movie season. In keeping with the spirit, and because it's still a little too cold here for me to swim, I went out and saw The Avengers yesterday.

It has everything that you'd expect from a big budget superhero movie, big bangs, big trouble, big evil villans trying to take over the world and a troop of one-liner spouting champions who save everyone from certain doom!

It all sounds great, right? I thought so too, but as I sat there ruining my bathing suit figure with too much popcorn and root beer, I was struck by how little difference there seemed to be between the villans and the heroes.

Wrap Up, Things I Learned From Lent

With the Easter holiday and the start of the soccer season things have been mighty busy in these parts, but hey, what's a little mainlined caffeine among friends? Anyway, I have been wanting to write an update on what I learned from my Lent experiment.

The Creative Journey - Beginnings

New ideas...they can be as cute as a pile of puppies. All shiny and cuddly you just want pick 'um up play patty cake with those cuddly-wuddly little faces! Whoo doggy!

So last week I wrote about the beginnings of a new project. Well I put in my yarn order, and I got a total score, some odd ends of the finest cashmere from Todd and Duncan. It's gonna suit my needs smashingly! Here it is.

Wanna Get More Liberty? You Have the Power Voter

Today North Carolina is voting on what constitues a marriage.

How heady, to think that a simple majority can decide such a question for everyone. As voters we have come to enjoy our collective power to dictate what is moral and just to all those simpletons who have the audacity to disagree with our world view.

Surviving the Creative Life - A New Project

I don't know what this is going to be yet!

It's been what... a month? Whew! I got two stories finished and sent them out to contest. In rough draft form for a brand new story I now have Chapter 1 finished and Chapter 2 almost finished. And I have two more stories underway for a contest deadline in July. But you know what? It's not enough!

This weekend, after making 18 lemon pies for my church auction and just before racing all over town to catch some of the four soccer games my kids were playing in on Sunday, I took a few hours to go down to the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival.

Get Yourself Moving, Dedicate Your Effort to Something Bigger

Just look at these guys! This picture is from a dedication ceremony at Nasa. I don't know what they are dedicating, maybe a new fire resistant parachute, or a space junk collecting vacuum cleaner. Heck, it could be a new tastee-freeze vending machine. Doesn't matter. What matters is the effort at dedication.

I've spent the last few weeks working on some fiction writing I'm trying to get finished before May. There is a contest coming up that I'd like to enter if I can manage to turn the pair of stories I have been wrestling with into something a little better than the bathroom scrawl they currently are. In the process I have discovered that I have a hard time switching between blog writing to fiction. 

This has been a great revelation for me because it has given me the chance to evaluate why I have this hang up, and see if there is anything that I can do to improve on it. Which brings me back to the Nasa diggers above.

Get a Few More Years by Plugging Into Your Community

Even though I spent the last week working on some fiction writing, I have been mulling over ways to find the words to review _The Longevity Project_ which I finished up just a little over 2 weeks ago. It is a new release, so if you haven't read it yet I recommend you put it on your short list if you'd like to be around to see your eighth decade or more. The book is as fascinating as it is insightful.

In short it is the sum of the discoveries that have come out of an eighty year long study of individuals chosen in youth for their academic performance. What followed was a lifetime of detailed records of their lives which have now been used to try and discover why some lived to be 80, 90, even over 100 years old, while others winked so much earlier.

Get Fresh - You Can Do it Spaghetti Sauce - Great Taste that Builds Community

It's Lent and I'm still not shopping, so I've gone up to my elbows into another love, cooking.

Spaghetti sauce. Like the lusty moist goodness of North Carolina barbeque, it is one of those foods that lives in a special place of the heart. It is a warm and tender reminder of the comforts of childhood and an excuse for endless fist shaking debates. With good reason too. Done well it can transport us the recesses of our youth, yet it is cheap enough to prepare that serving an army is totally within reason.

Why You Need Lent, Even if You're Not Christian

A lot of folks probably know that Tuesday was Mardi Gras. It's long been adopted as a secular excuse to eat green and purple cake and party like a rock star. Big parades, bead throwing and a little flashing, what's not to love? But what about the morning after? I'm sure for some of the same folks that is the more understated, hangover day, best honored kneeling at a porcelain altar, aspirin on standby. But for the religious minded it is Ash Wednesday, or the start of Lent.

If you're not Catholic or Lutheran or Orthodox or any of the other denominations that hold this tradition you might not know that Lent is a ritualized time of sacrifice. That's pretty straight forward, after a bender like Mardi Gras it should be easy logic to at least give up drinking for a while. But can it be something more? I believe that Lent is a tradition that can teach us some powerful lessons if we are willing to take it on.

Whitney Houston - Who Really Deserves Flag Honors Anyway?

In case you haven't heard, singing legend Whitney Houston passed away on 11 Feb 2012, and she was laid to rest on Sat. the 18th. The outpouring of love an grief has been so great that I almost missed the coverage about one less than overwhelmed dad, John Burri. He was already in mourning for the death of his son Eric Burri, who lost his life in 2005 to an IED while serving in the Middle East.

According to reports, John Burri burned a New Jersey state flag "...to show Gov. Christie how offensive it was," that the flags in his state were lowered to half-staff in honor of the passing of Whitney.

I thought that was a very curious reaction, but it did get me to think. Who do we value, why and how much? To a lesser degree there is also a question letting bygones be bygones. In other words, is it still appropriate to honor someone who has fallen from grace.

What is Success? 5 Toxic Myths

Boy was it disappointing to discover that my phone company was doing me wrong. I hope that folks have found my story informative and helpful. It's the kind of thing that I hate doing, yet corporate personhood aside, I believe that we have a duty to call out bad behavior in business, just like we must act to maintain healthy boundaries with other people. So now I'm gonna grab my cultural warrior coat.

WARNING! AT&T Hidden Charge Phone Scam - Unwanted Tips

It takes a lot to work up my ire, but phone companies have a knack for it. I learned today about a new way that AT&T has discovered to reach into my pocket and loot my wallet and I want to share my tale with everyone. For the last few months one of the household cell phones has been popping up a text that said:

"Lovegenietips Flirting Tips; 3msg/week for $9.99/m T&Cs: lovegenietips.com Msg&data rates may apply. Reply HELP for help, STOP to cancel. PIN 2QRH

Suspecting it was a phishing scam...

Toe-Curling Flavors #2 - Truffle Butter - Truffle Salt

Dieters, we must unite! We are under attack by our reptilian past. It wants to dine. It wants to bring that spoon to my lips, pry open my jaw and fill my belly with the nearest, stickiest calorie. I have clamped my mouth shut. I have even covered it with my hand...and some tape... and some magic marker saying 'No'. But it's the second week of February, it's snowing and between you and me that toffee bar and pasta is a heck of a lot closer than bathing suit weather. I need help... I must combat the need for sweet!

Whew! Can I peek my eyes now? The craving has passed, but not without

Playful Crows and Animal Consciousness

It's been about a year since I started feeding the crows and it has been amazing to see what other people have observed them doing. So far shared toboggan rides and ball games are still a long way off with my crew, but they are showing signs of wanting to communicate. They watch me put out the food from the safety of the trees, but when I'm late coming out in the morning one will stand on the back rail and give me a squawk.  Then she'll look in through the glass door at me until I get up. It's not a round of hoops but for these parts, where plenty of folks do their best to chase the crows away, I think it's a pretty good start. I'm looking forward to seeing how they are in the spring when they have new chicks to feed.

And it will be a good time for it. With first ever Conference on Animal Consciousness coming up in

What are You Teaching Your Kids About Money?

When I was growing up the only thing that I knew about money was that we didn't have any. Or more specifically, I didn't have any. Other folks did, even a few distant family members, but it was often a source of contention. From a child's vantage point, hidden under the skirts of the dinner table, I quickly came to understand that money could make you more equal when it came to excusing bad behavior, but also secretly reviled, especially if you had the nerve to talk poor-mouth.

As an adult I can now see that it wasn't just me growing up with weird attitudes. Americans have issues with money. We love it, we want it and we hate you if you have it and we don't. But guys...come on...seriously, is this healthy?

Money is a funny thing. We do need it, at least so much as

Being Better #4 - The Problem with Being Limitless

I have done it! After much hand wringing, wailing indecision and some thoroughly embarrassing hiding under the covers with a tub of peanut butter, I have set a limit! Ok...just a second...give me some air...

Whoa, what happened?

I'm sure you have been there. Most everyone has had someone in your life who presumed too much. Someone who asked for things you didn't really want to give or

Hack Yourself with Your Other Hand

Which hand do you use the most? You know... the one you use to open doors or to write, or to do that thing that.... yeah, that hand.

I have recently started working my way through How to Train a Wild Elephant: And Other Adventures in Mindfulness, and thus far it has been an adventure with some unexpected benefits which don't have anything to do with either mindfulness or being embarrassed when your mother walks in. They have to do with boosting creativity.

But first let me roll back a bit and

Darkness at Noon - Wikipedia, SOPA, PIPA and the Deputizing of the Internet

As you may have already heard, tomorrow Wikipedia and a number of other sites will go dark. Ok...so, it probably won't happen at noon, nor is it likely to be accompanied by the jingle of spurs or the screams of horses. However, if things go as planned it is likely to have as big an impact as the proverbial old west showdown. 

And we should hope so too because there is a lot at stake. The central issue is piracy, be it music, movies or ...books? *sniff*  If people want to

Being Better #3 - Say Hello to Your Inner Demons

Cognitive dissonance has negative power in our lives because of the lies we tell ourselves. 

For a moment think of life as a dinner date. Here we sit. Maybe we still have a half glass red wine dangling dangerously in one hand and one or two empty green bottles at our feet. We talk about about the ways in which the world has given us a raw deal and how things would be so much better if it wasn't for x,y and z holding us down. We may even expound on our own awesomeness and what a crime it is that the world is missing out on our personal greatness. 

What we don't want to talk about is

Toe-Curling Flavors #1 - Toasted Sesame Oil

New series! I spend a lot of my time thinking about how to be a better person, and how to make the world a better place. But other times I just want to enjoy something amazing. In this series I'm going to focus on food. Sweet, savory, biting, briny, bordellos for the taste buds, bring it on!  Let's face it, even for the most randy among us, we are all going to eat a heck of a lot more often than we are ever going to have sex. Why not make it a phenomenal experience!

To begin...in an earlier incarnation of my life I worked for about a decade in the restaurant industry, culminating in a stint as a pastry/dessert chef. The most important thing that I learned

Being Better #2 - Admitting Failure - Why is it So Hard?

How many times have you caught yourself saying, "I know I was the one driving, but if she hadn't walked out into the road, she never would have been hit. I mean, who just steps into a crosswalk without looking thoroughly? Do you trust those 'walk now' signs? I know I don't."

Mercy. Say I'm an a-hole, just don't say I'm wrong.

Ok, so that was an exaggeration, but it does show how our thinking often goes when we run smack dab into a failure. And why is that? What makes it so hard to just say