Bein’ Franklin

Posted by DaddyFranklin at May 26th, 2008

Posted by DaddyFranklin at May 26th, 2008

I just browsed through my photo album and thought you might enjoy these:

Posted by DaddyFranklin at May 21st, 2008

I attended Timothy’s Hawaiian end-of-year party at his school.  Despite the fact that Timothy was proud to wear his grass skirt (hula) and some “jewel” stickers, it was a lot of fun for me.  I followed the class around as they went on a scavenger hunt finding each element of their outfit before going back to their classroom for lunch.  I, then, entertained a few kids by dancing my own version of hula dance and sticking paper umbrellas in my cap.

Tomorrow will be Zachary’s party.

Posted by DaddyFranklin at May 15th, 2008

Today, I went with Timothy’s class on a field trip to a place in Lubbock called Kenny’s Korral.  It was a blast, as you can probably tell from the pictures and videos.

Posted by DaddyFranklin at May 14th, 2008

For nearly a decade, I’ve had fruitless mulberry trees in my yard.  In Plainview, living there from 2000 - 2007, we had one very large in the front yard and one equally large in the back.  They provided massive amounts of shade, which was great for the front yard, not so great for the back since the previous owners of the house had installed an above ground pool that spent the hottest hours of the day in that shade.   It made for pretty cold swimming.

It was almost comforting to see that the house we decided to rent in Lubbock also had one of these trees in the back yard.  Well, turns out, to my surprise, it is not a fruitless mulberry.  Similar though it is to those Plainview trees, we are now tracking mulberry juice into the house as it has shed quite a few berries. 

Looks like we have ourselves a good old fashioned Texas Mulberry tree:

Posted by DaddyFranklin at May 13th, 2008

Timothy celebrated his 5th birthday last Wednesday and we gave him the privilege of being in charge most of the day (like choosing where to eat.) We had his birthday party at Ready, Set, Go! in Lubbock which is a gymnastics place like the one in Plainview. Several of his friends attended (all girls, if you must know). We had a great time. Check out the pics below:

Posted by DaddyFranklin at May 12th, 2008

I finally made it to the golf course!! I played Elm Grove in Lubbock. The course is what most people with whom I play might call a “goat ranch”. The greens were in decent shape, but the fairways were not. It’s not a very exciting course, but you know what? I couldn’t have cared less. I was on the golf course and I was playing golf. As far as I can remember, that’s the first time I can say that in over a year.

I shot an 89 but there were some high points that will definitely bring me back to the course. My handicap used to be around 11 or 12, so I was quite a bit worse than that on a course with a rating of 69.8.

Highlight of the round came on the last shot. I sunk a 30 foot putt for par to break 90. I approached the last hole knowing that it would make the difference between a round in the 80s or a round in the 90s. I definitely would be discouraged to start out in the 90s, but hitting the 89 mark would be a good omen for the upcoming summer. Number 18 was a par 5 straight into the wind. First shot was a driver straight down the middle, which happened to true for most of the back side. Second shot was a little left with a 3 wood leaving me about 40 yards short of the green. The approach was too short with my Cleveland sand wedge (my short game was atrocious most of the day, no touch). I tried to bump it close with a 5 iron from just off the green and still left it about 30 feet short. The last putt was make or break, par or bogey, 80s or 90s. I lined it up and drained it. The crowd went wild! Okay, so it was just me but I did pump my fist in the air and gave out a w00t.

Good day.

Posted by DaddyFranklin at May 8th, 2008

Posted by DaddyFranklin at April 27th, 2008

I was in tears by the end.  Very powerful and moving

Posted by DaddyFranklin at April 27th, 2008

I know everyone has their own technique and what works for one person won’t work for another.  I, personally, get hiccups fairly regularly, generally after not chewing my food well enough followed by a large swig of Diet Dr. Pepper.  Although, sometimes they show up spontaneously. 

I have a list of things to try and almost never have to live with them for very long.  The first thing I try is around 90% effective for me.  I’ve offered the suggestion to a few of my friends and they’ve had mixed results.  Nevertheless, it’s a fairly sure thing for me.

Technique #1: Timing the Hiccups

Depending on if I have watch handy, I’ll do this different ways.  When I can watch the second hand of the watch or the seconds on a digital watch, I will count the number of hiccups in a minute and then focus very intently on making the subsequent minute have fewer hiccups.  I came up with this by remembering when I was in grade school and I had a few friends that would use hiccups as an excuse to go to the bathroom or the water fountain.  The teacher would ask them to hiccup and the entire class would turn and watch.  Then, inevitably, they wouldn’t be able to.  A few times, I actually had the hiccups and asked to go get a drink.  When I was put in spotlight, I was unable to follow through no matter how severe the hiccups had been.  Seems to me that focusing intently on making yourself hiccup can help rid yourself of this infirmity.  Timing is a good way to make myself focus on them and force the next one.  If I don’t have a watch, I time them by counting the number of seconds between each hiccup trying to make the time extend longer and longer, until they are gone.  Usually if I can get to 30 seconds between hiccups, they are gone.

Technique #2: Holding my breath

This has been much less effective.  In those 10% of cases I can’t rid myself of hiccups otherwise, I will just hold my breathe as long as possible.  It occasionally works.

Technique #3: Drinking backwards

This stopped working for me years ago, but in the last few months I have gone back to it and have been surprisingly successful.  Take a full glass of water and drink the entire glass from the opposite side.  Drink from the side that is farthest away from you.  You have to lean yourself way over, ending up almost upside down by the time the glass is empty.  You might want to excuse yourself so you don’t do this in public, because, not only is it an embarrassing position to contort yourself into, you are also likely to spill some up your nose which will definitely create a scene.

Happy hiccupping!