Babylon 5 is my favorite TV show. It had characters with real flaws, who dealt with real-life issues and the episodes were not interchangeable, like "Brand X" (Star Trek). This series taught me that "You must do the right thing for the right reasons. If you do the right thing for the wrong reasons, you will corrupt and destroy the good you have created."

I learned yesterday that Jerry Doyle, the actor who played Chief Warrant Officer Michael Garibaldi, died suddenly at age 60. He joins Andreas Katsulas (G'kar), Richard Biggs (Dr. Stephen Franklin) and Jeff Conaway (Sgt. Zack Allan) in the Great Unknown.

While probably many people who watched B5 identified with the characters Sinclair or Sheridan (for the ladies Ivanova or Delenn), I always identified with Garibaldi. He didn't take any guff, he was very passionate and didn't compromise his principles. Garibaldi had a clear sense of right and wrong and a strong loyalty to his friends. He took care of his friends and was very indirect on how he exacted revenge against those who hurt him. Out of all of the scenes with Mr. Garibaldi, this one is the one I like the best:

The only loose end not tied up by the series end was how Garibaldi took care of Bester. After some research, I found out that Garibaldi (after the no-harm block was removed) pursued Bester. In the end, Garibaldi left Bester alive, in prison and stripped of his telepathic abilities.

Good night, Jerry. You will be missed.

I'm not allowed to cook.

In 1988, when I was still freshly married to my bride, she demanded that I assist her in preparing our meals. So one evening she called me into the kitchen, handed me a bulb of garlic and a cleaver and told me to crush a couple of cloves. Not knowing the difference between a clove and a bulb, I put the entire bulb down and got ready to crush it. She screamed "NO!!!" then broke off a couple of cloves. Again, not being versed in the Way of the Kitchen, I then exerted my entire force on these cloves of garlic, reducing them to an unusable mess. She banished me from the kitchen at that point.

In 2013, while Junior Warden of my Masonic Lodge, I was carrying out my duties as JW by doing the cooking for my brothers at Lodge meetings. I told them before they elected me to this position, "Many people have eaten my cooking and have gone on to live normal lives." They thought I was joking. I ended up choking on a pork steak I cooked and spent twelve days in the hospital, five of them in ICU. I have a dead leg from my cooking.

Tonight, both my bride and son were unable to prepare dinner. My bride told me to fix some Red Beans and Rice with Bratwurst. Simple, right? So you think...

I was instructed to use two boxes of RB&R, each of which the instructions called for three cups of water. Everything seemed to be going to plan, except that 15 minutes after the called for 35 minute cook time, there was still lots of water in the pot with the RB&R. It was at this point that I realized that the measuring cup I used to measure the water didn't hold one cup, but two... I put twelve cups of water in the pot, not six.

In the end, dinner was overcooked, wet and tasteless RB&R. The brats were just as tasteless, as the beer I added to the water for flavor had boiled off in the extra cook time.

After dumping half of her dinner in the trash, my beautiful bride of twenty-seven years told me, "I would rather starve than eat your cooking again." I'm not sure how I should feel about this...

As they say, "That didn't last long."

I've tried for the past month to work a job in sales, specifically car sales. The one thing I discovered was that it isn't for me. What attracted me was that I had recently become a "free agent" and a training class for this field dropped into my lap as I received news of my impending "free agency."

The potential for a high level of income is there in sales, if you can withstand the demands. Make no mistake, the people I worked with over the past month were great, supportive and sharing in encouragement and knowledge.

The downfall is it's a "feast or famine" kind of job. When you arrive in the morning, you get on the phones to make calls to people in your tickler file, review any appointments for the day. Then you do sales training, motivation exercises and product training. This usually takes 1-2 hours. Then you wait until a customer comes. Until that customer walks onto the lot, you're stuck in a high alert mode. Once you make contact with a customer, you have to be high energy until the customer leaves, which can be anywhere from 30 minutes if they are "just looking" to 5-6 hours after which they leave in a new vehicle.

That hypervigilance combined with 50+ hour work weeks became a detriment to my health. I was also unable to help my family because they are night owls due to my bride's sun sensitivity, while I naturally wake up at 5:30am most days. So, I wake up and do my morning routine and other minor stuff until I left for work at 8:30am or so, work 9 to 11 hours then come home. Once home I only had 2-3 hours to do everything before heading to bed.

I am not afraid of hard work. I will do whatever I can by legal and moral means to secure the emotional, physical and economic health of my family.

I have placed this in the Recovery category rather than the Personal category because this is about my recovery. I have not spoken about my issues that led to the creation of this blog in a long time. I think today is the day to break that streak.

Why do we enthusiastically celebrate a child's birthday? Why the swats, with "one to grow on" and the extra candle? Because as late as the 1950's, a significant number of children died young. They died from diseases we have either eliminated totally (Smallpox) or rendered irrelevant through general medical science and vaccines specifically. Diseases like Whooping Cough, Measles, Mumps, Rubella and Polio ravaged children back then. Today they are almost unheard of because of vaccines. I am one of the last to be vaccinated against Smallpox. They don't vaccinate against that anymore since it has been eliminated.

Because a child's' next birthday was never guaranteed, we held out hope that the child would live to next year by placing next years candle on this years birthday cake. The same basic concept goes for the "birthday spankings."

Once I reached adulthood, my birthdays never really mattered to me. I was amazed that one day I was considered a child and under the law a non-entity and property of my parents, yet the next morning I was magically an adult, able to enter into contracts, serve my country and be ultimately responsible for myself.

I continue that tradition today, and I'll tell you why.

When Robin Williams died in 2014, a lot of people said, "It is a tragedy he died so young [at age 63]." I regard that he lived until 63 as a miracle. In the 1970's and early 80's (up until his friend John Belushi died), Robin was self-medicating his depression with cocaine and alcohol. If he had completed suicide or overdosed on something like a speedball that took Belushi's life in say, 1981 at the height of Mork & Mindy, that would have been the true tragedy, because we would have lost him 34 years earlier when he was 29. Think of everything he had done after Mork & Mindy, then think those roles would have been performed by other actors or maybe not at all.

During my dark days of 1999-2002, I stood toe-to-toe with Death and got into a staring match with him several times. Each time, I made Death blink first. I could have missed out of all the experiences I have had with my wife and son between then and now or will have with them in the days yet to come. People with a mental illness die on average twenty years sooner than a person who never experiences depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia or any of the other mental illnesses.

I don't celebrate the anniversary of my birth anymore, because I celebrate every day that I wake up. I thank my God that I am alive and able to get out of bed and move forward each and every day. At this point of my life, because of what I have been through, every day is my birthday.

Last week, I received an unexpected call from my supervisor to come over and see him. I immediately made the 10 minute transit to his office to see what was up.

He was reluctant to give me the bad news I had actually been expecting for a while. You see, I was hired to my current job to develop and maintain the company website and manage the social media. The social media side didn't work out (a long story that I'm not going to get into) and I have brought the website to fruition and it is currently in "maintenance mode." At the last Board of Directors meeting, it was decided that my position be curtailed to the hours necessary to maintain the website. I am being cut back from 40 hours a week to 8.

As my supervisor sadly relayed this information to me, his assessment of my was confirmed beyond all doubt.

Like I said, I had been expecting this for a while. After the initial shock had passed, my first question was, "Is there anything I can do for the company that will allow me to keep my hours up?"

I subscribe to a cycle that everyone goes through many times a day. Something happens to you. That event produces a feeling inside of you. You assign a thought to that feeling, then you make a decision on how to act based on that thought before you actually react to what happened to you. Many people run through that entire cycle without pause. They let the most important part of that cycle go by without consideration. Because you can control everything after the feeling. You can pause that cycle to actively consider and choose the thought, decision and action you take based on that feeling. Or you can "knee-jerk" (reflexively) act.

Most people would be shocked and scared to know they are taking an 80% pay cut. Many people would have an angry or belligerent response. My response was to see what I can do different to help the company.

My supervisor, Cordell Walker is a man of great personal integrity and character. I have known him for years and he became my friend long before he was my supervisor. How he carries himself gives you the impression that he is like a granite obelisk. Tall, solid and unshakeable. He gave his honest assessment of me, stating he was pretty sure that would be my response to the news. He is impressed every day with my professionalism, demeanor and outlook on my job and my life. He knows and supports my first objective, the financial security and stability of my family.

With friends like him, I cannot fail.

I admire Mike Rowe. He is a rare breed of man. He is not afraid to get dirty. He is a champion for skilled labor. He laments about the crumbling infrastructure, then points to all of the young people who want to go to college. These young people come out of college, unprepared for real work because they have a degree in Comparative Icelandic Literature and zero practical skills. He is doing the Lords work, through his mikeroweWORKS website where he helps people learn skilled work. Plumbers, electricians, carpenters and all of the other good-paying skilled labor that would fix our infrastructure problems.

Here he is at a TED talk discussing this. The first 2/3rds is him waxing anecdotally about castrating sheep with his teeth (mentioning anagnorisis and peripeteia along the way) and being on a crab boat in 50 foot seas. The important part starts about 15:00 into the video.

As long as all of us look with disdain upon the skilled worker as some type of Morlock, this situation of empty factories and crumbling infrastructure will only get worse. The large, publicly traded companies who only have their eyes on beating next quarters' stock dividend predictions can include themselves in the blame for this predicament we are in. Many of our skilled labor jobs will change as things progress. There are many types of jobs that no longer exist and there are many jobs that no one could have conceived 30 years ago. However there are still many skilled labor positions that will be around for a long time to come.

It is time we laud their efforts and encourage young people to pursue the skilled trades.

On February 20th, 1962, fifty-four years ago, Astronaut John Glenn, USMC became the first American to orbit the Earth. That was back during a time when you literally put your life into God's Hands, as when you strapped yourself onto the top of a rocket (made by the lowest bidder), you had just as much chance of experiencing a "flight anomaly" (i.e., blowing up) as it did delivering you safely into orbit.

I admire Colonel Glenn for his many years of service to his country and his many achievements. I don't always agree with his politics, however that does not prevent me from supporting his stances on topics I agree with.

The man known as Jesus of Nazareth has always been shrouded in mystery. Many people see him as many things. Some people have studied what records we have of him intently, others go off second and third hand information.

Our main records of his life and actions, the Holy Bible, have been through at least four revisions. From oral records before being written down in Aramaic, translated to Greek, then to Latin, then to English and other languages. Each translation left something behind and added new things through translation of what the words mean plus the agenda of the translator.

December 25th is most likely not the day that Jesus was born. The shepherds would not have been out in the fields with their flock in the wintertime, as they were when Angels came to them to proclaim the birth of Jesus. It is also documented that the Catholic Church (who has parallels with the Borg) picked this day to bring Pagans and Romans (who respectively celebrated the winter solstice and Saturnalia about the same time) into the Church.

I personally don't care what day we select to celebrate the birth of Christ Jesus (except April 15th).

What is important is we do set aside a day to contemplate the life of a man whose life caused such a change in the entire world that we changed the calendar that we use to measure time from before and after his birth.

This man, God made Flesh, was many things. Healer, teacher, advocate, and even rabble rouser. Do not forget that in Matthew 21:12 he drove the money changers out of the Temple. So disrupting business where it shouldn't be and chasing people with a bullwhip is certainly one of the possible options of "What Would Jesus Do?"

I try to carry two of His examples forward every day.

The first being Mark 12:30-31, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."

The second one surprisingly is Luke 22:36, "He said to them, "But now is you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one." If you read this in context, Jesus means 'arm yourself for self-defense.'

I ask that you enjoy yourself today, and if you are a Christian to do your best to carry out His teachings every day of the year. To my friends and brothers of different (or no) faiths, I ask that you also do your best to live up to the moral teachings you hold dear. Use them as a lamp to lead others, not a bludgeon to make others believe as you do.

I haven't written about rocketry in years, since I lost my last rocket. It took most of a year to save up the several hundred dollars for the rocket, motor (the fuel alone was $80), electronics,  parachutes and everything else. I launched it and it never came back. Here is a picture of me with it:

Well, SpaceX has performed a first tonight. They launched a rocket into LEO (Low Earth Orbit) and instead of letting the first stage splash into the sea, they landed it upright and under power back near the launch site.

12/24/15 UPDATE:

I found the short version of the flight on YouTube. Here it is:

Here is a recording of the entire mission, from build-up until after the last satellite was deployed. Jump to the 32 minute mark to see the landing itself.

Yesterday, a story was broadcast on The PBS NewsHour Weekend Edition. It was on the Crisis Intervention Team, which are police officers trained how to handle and deescalate a situation involving a person experiencing a mental health crisis.

I used those services in my dark days during 1999-2002. I was on a first name basis with these guys. It was this program that kept me in the hospital when I needed to be there and not in the county lockup, with an arrest record and probably a couple of felonies on me.

Here is the article. I show up about 7:30:

If I had acquired the felonies I had earned back then, I might be getting out of prison about now. I would not have been who I am now if I had that holding me back.

The CIT is one of the groups of people that not only kept me alive, but helped me get the help I needed. My wife, my friends and the CIT helped me become the advocate I am today. I am honored that I get to pay back my debt to them by being part of one of the classes the future CIT officers go through to be CIT certified.

If your local police or Sheriff's office does not have a CIT program, urge them to contact the Memphis Police Department CIT program today.

I posted up on Facebook at 1AM this morning (that's the 1am BEFORE the time change) that I was having difficulty sleeping. This is why:

On Tuesday, I was interviewed for a weekend news article by PBS about the Crisis Intervention Team. During that interview, I talked about a lot of things that were going on in my life at the time I "partook" of the CIT's services. Today, I participate in a presentation for about two hours of their 40 hours of training to give them a clear insight into what's going on inside someone who is having a crisis. I did one of these classes and then I was interviewed right after. The interview by itself was quite intense and draining for me emotionally.

When I have to speak to a group of people, I can "turn up" my mania somewhat so I am outgoing, happy, funny and all that. But I pay a price for that manic swing. For several days afterward I am "depressive." Not a full blown depression, just a taste of the worst parts.

One of the subjects I covered in the interview was my relationship with my sister. She is eight years older than I and the last time I spoke with her was on her birthday in December of 2002. I was fresh out of my last hospitalization and I had called her to wish her a happy birthday. There were icicles hanging off my phone by the end of the call, her response, while polite, left no ambiguity about our relationship. Because, you see, I called her once while I was hospitalized, begging for help. Her response was, "You're faking it." When I started really getting out of control and violent, my wife wanted to send our son up to my sisters, so he could have a stable childhood and she could concentrate on getting me the help I needed. My sister refused to take our son in, because, "I don't want 'him' [me] showing up at the house."

The last time I exchanged emails with her, I received the same response, polite and very cold. She even said, "Do not friend my children (who were 38-42 years old then) on Facebook, your radical views (this blog) might hurt their careers."

The next day was the 14th anniversary of my fathers passing. He died sometime on that Sunday morning, in my sisters home in Hospice. I was in the hospital (yet again) and called to try and speak with him, when my oldest nephew who answered the phone told me, "Grandpa died overnight."

My father was a stoic, quiet man who got things done without fanfare or notoriety. A Navy veteran of WWII, he started out as a welder, worked his way up to shop foreman, then graduated into the front office and told the fabrication shop how to do their job. His sense of humor was very quiet and punny. He would hit you with a pun and be out of range before you understood what he really said.

Right before he retired and I joined the Navy, my mom and dad were taking a walk around the neighborhood, and stopped to talk with a neighbor. The neighbor asked him, "Garth, now that you're retiring, what are you going to do as a hobby?" My dad looked left, then right, shrugged his shoulders and said, "Sex." About a month after that, the Pastor's wife (we both sung in the church choir, the Pastor and his family lived down the street from us) came up to me after the service and asked me, "How is your fathers hobby going?" I said something like, "All day, every day."

Growing up, I never had everything I wanted, but I did have everything I needed. I suspect he had Asperger's Syndrome. He was a 60 year Mason, and Master of a lodge he was a charter member of. He tried to interest me in Masonry several times and I never took him up on it. It took me digging through his things seven years after he passed to find a set of his old Masonic books. At that moment, I swear I could feel his hand on my shoulder and his voice in my ear, "It's time you joined." I started the process to become a Mason that afternoon. It has been his legacy that has driven me to become Master of my lodge, to be able to understand and perform the ritual and become a better man, citizen, husband, father. Dad, I miss you.

Do not worry, this will pass. Hurt and regret are scars that heal over time, yet when you move a certain way, the scars let you know they are still there. Such is the case here. Thank you to all who responded to my prayer request this morning.

I think this article is great. It's a wonderful start and could go very far. The mayor of Albuquerque saw a homeless man with a 'Will work' sign. It gave him a great idea.

This is a program where a van drives around, looking for homeless people. The homeless people who say "yes" (over 70% of them do) get in, and they work for 5 1/2 hours doing beautification work. They get a free lunch and $45 when they are dropped off at a center where they have access to food, shelter and other services.

When a person becomes homeless, they lose many things besides a roof over their head. They lose a safe place to sleep. They lose the ability to have a place to safely store their things. The number of their possessions are literally reduced to what they can carry. They have little or no access to hygiene, or food. No refrigerator, no storing food. No stove, no preparing food, except in the most rudimentary way. For most of them, the only clothes they have are the ones they are wearing. They also lose the ability to receive Postal Mail. With them limited to what they can carry, a SS Card/birth certificate/ID to verify the persons identity is probably non-existent.

So, here is this person who wants to work. How they got there is unimportant. Where they want to be in the future is. They have skills and abilities. However their entire day is spent chasing the chance of a meal and a place to sleep for the night. They don't have the ability to clean themselves and wear clean, neat clothes for a job interview. They can't receive mail to get job offers (no more "General Delivery" at the Post Office) and most likely have no way to reliably access email, even if they have an email address. A steady job, would, by the way end their homelessness pretty quickly.

In a situation like this, you can't "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" because... you have no boots, let alone bootstraps.

I can see how a program like this can be improved. Have local businesses work with this program. If a person works a certain number of shifts, they get an interview with a business "as-is," meaning their cleanliness and condition is not a consideration in the interview. The business pays the deposit and 2-3 months rent for a furnished studio or one-bedroom apartment, having the new worker gradually repay the debt and move forward.

I have known people who have slept on the streets so long, when they get into a place of their own, it sometimes takes 6+ months before they stop sleeping on the floor with all their things in the corner behind them.

If you can, start a program like this in your town. Lift others up. Pay it forward. Do good deeds.

I found this image the other day on Cyanide and Happiness and it brought a lot of intense thoughts and feelings back from those days when my illness raged through my life.

Back then, I wanted to die more times than I could count. The physical, mental and emotional pain of my bipolar disorder was at times unbearable. What made it worse was watching myself traumatize my family repeatedly, powerless to stop myself. The weight of my pain plus knowing the terrible things I was doing to those I love drove me to several serious attempts. I have stared into the eyes of Death himself and made him back down.

If I could say there was one thing that kept me from completing a suicide was my son. I didn't want him to have a "conversation" with my grave like this.

Twenty-seven years ago, I stood before God and man and pledged all that I was and all that I would be to one woman. I was twenty-seven years old then, so I have spent half my life with her.

She has been through some horrific things with me. I have made some pretty grievous errors in judgement. The one moment in my life that I truly needed unconditional help, support and love was when I crawled into my closet and started screaming and crying. To prove her love for me, she got in there with me and held me. She let me know I was not alone. I can never repay what I owe her.

A marriage is not all good times and orgasms. There are tough times, arguments and hurt feelings as well. You have to take the good and the bad together. It's a life-long commitment between two people to never give up on each other. There were more times than I want to think about where we should have divorced. Each time, we both made the decision to stick it out one more day.

I tell people, "I am humbled and honored that she chooses to wake up next to me every morning. I am astonished and amazed that I get to wake up next to her every morning, because that means she hasn't killed me in my sleep." The first two parts are true. The third part is my attempt at humor.

To be honest, the thought that I may have to wake up one morning without her there freezes my blood and fills my soul with terror. I keep that thought in a triple locked box buried in the back yard because I don't know how I would deal with it.

The song Circle by Harry Chapin gives me hope that I will find her in the next life. One verse says:

"I've found you a thousand times,

I guess you've done the same.

But then we'll lose each other,

It's just like a children's game.

As I find you here again,

The thought goes through my mind,

Our love is like a circle,

Let's go 'round one more time."

For all the words I have in my vocabulary, none of them can come close to expressing my feelings for this woman. To my beautiful bride, I love you. I want to spent at least another twenty-seven years with you, if you'll have me.

If you have been wondering why I have been silent, I've been busy.

Last night, my lodge had what is called an "Official Visit." This is an annual inspection to see how well we perform the ritual, and to test brothers for certification cards. There are three of these cards, which build on each other.

The Lecturers Card certifies you to teach the work that a brother must memorize before he advances to the next degree. The work is a question-and-answer session where the brother explains what happened to him during his degree. This has always been a "mouth-to-ear" type of session, it has never been written down. You have to know the questions to ask and be able to catch the brother if he misses or adds a word.

The Proficiency Card is everything the Lecturers Card is, plus you must be able to perform any part in the first section of the three degrees. Lodge officers from the Senior Deacon and up must have this card, or it counts against the Lodge during the Official Visit.

The Pin of Excellence is a rare thing. This means you can perform any part, any section, any degree. There are couple hundred Masons in my District. About 20 Masons have this pin, and twelve of those are in my Lodge. I think only about a hundred Masons in the entire state has this pin.

For the past 4 months, I have been studying for my Pin of Excellence. This has meant long hours, my nose buried in my ritual book and talking to myself. Last night, I went up for it.

In the immortal words of Agent 86,

The good news is I can keep trying, this is not a once-a-year or less type of test. The Grand Lecturer said I literally just missed it because I didn't use the proper words in a couple of instances. For example, one part the proper word is "contained" and I used "enclosed." You may not think that's a big deal, however it really is. I have said it for years, words mean things. Our ritual is very particular and exact in the words it uses. To change a word like that here and there could, by cumulative effect, change the message and the lesson you are trying to impart.

I am happy and proud that I was held to that standard. This will only inspire me to try harder and try again.

I have needed to send and receive all of these cards for years. Where can I find them?

I have a wireless weather station outside (duh!) and the remote here next to my system. Right now, it says the heat index is 115 degrees. I'm not from around here, I don't take too well to super hot weather like this. I just wish I could be like Jean Claude Van-Damme:

I might get comfortable doing this...

I was involved with something this past weekend. Part of it involved etiquette. The person talking about said, "Remember what you were taught in Kindergarten." This struck a deep chord within me, because no matter where I look or go in this world, either in-person or on-line, I meet too many people who's first response to most situations is to be mean and hurtful. Frankly, any number above zero is too many.

The types of meaness are almost too many to count. Being mean to to others because they don't measure to "your" standards, anger at others who had nothing to do about why you are angry and can do nothing to solve the reason why you're angry. Maybe they don't have the same opinion/belief on a particular subject.

I feel pity for those people whos sole life purpose is to be offended about something. Or those who for some reason cannot stand another person having a different opinion or outlook on anything.

I have a single memory of Kindergarten. Mrs. Bowers was my teacher, a heavyset older lady, she retired not too long after I left her class. All I rember of her is her, with her back to me, playing a three note chord on the piano to signify the end of playtime. I did remember what she taught us about life.

• Be nice to each other. You don't have to like others, however you should always be polite.
• Share what's important. Make sure others have what they need.
• Life is not fair. Help others when you can.
• Play fair. It doesn't matter if you win or lose, the experience of playing with others is what you should aim for. A poor player quickly runs out of others to play with.
• Clean up after yourself. Leave where you've been a little nicer than how you found it.
• Apologize when you hurt others. Remember how you felt when you were hurt.
• Don't take things that don't belong to you.
• We are all different and the same. We each have different abilities, desires and interests. But we are all people.
• Never lose your sense of wonder.

There are many others, but if all of us could at least try and start to do these nine things consistently, imagine how wonderful our communities would be.

This was brought to my attention today. I normally not supportive of posts from the Huffington Post, however in this case I will be glad to make an exception. Granted, the post was made in 2012, but The 9 Nanas are still going.

The original article, It Ain't Over: The Business 9 Women Kept A Secret For Three Decades, is about a group of ladies who helped others. They did it just because they wanted to help others. They were not in it for their own glory, recognition or anything like that. They would still be unknown today if they hadn't been "outed."

Just imagine what our world would be like if we helped those around us without waiting for government to do it. You don't have to do it all, do what you can. Do it to help others and that happiness will come back to you multiplied by a thousand.

Back in May, I ripped iPage up one side and down the other for what they failed to do, make any effort to keep my websites and data secure.

Most people are all too willing to proclaim the shortfalls of another, but are rarely as enthusiastic as that when someone goes above and beyond the call to help them.

I am not one of those people. Let me tell you a story of customer service done right.

My beautiful bride of 26 years has some serious medical issues that require expensive medications that allow her to function. Without them, she is in constant massive pain, mental fog and physically unable to function. She also has a chance of dropping dead if these conditions are not monitored and treated. These medications allow her to have a quality of life.

Since I was laid off in February of 2014, her supply of these medications has been erratic at best. Every time she ran low, she became scared and took it out on me. Not because she was angry at me for failing to get her the medications, she had no one else she could express her feelings and fears to.

Now that I am employed, we are able to afford her to visit a clinic and receive prescriptions from a doctor for those medications. I chose RX Outreach to obtain these medications at such a discount that we can afford them.

I am not relating all of the little twists, turns and issues that went on for the sake of brevity. These are the important facts to know in this instance.

We were on TennCare when I was on disability for my own condition back in 2005, when the State of Tennessee parterned with Express Scripts and TennCare passed my wife's information to Express Scripts. We never knew about it and never used them. RX Outreach split off from Express Scripts some time ago and received a copy of her information.

I signed up with RX Outreach for my wife and the new information I gave them when I enrolled in May 2015 did not overwrite the 2005 information. Hence, when I attempted to log back in, I couldn't because the system was looking at the 2005 information when it was asking me security questions. I had to speak with a CSR (Customer Service Representative) to get it straightened out. Except she didn't follow through and purge the system of the old information.

When I got the prescriptions to RX Outreach and they send the medications, the meds went to our 2005 address that should have been deleted (we moved out of that address in 2007 and I told the CSR that).

It took multiple calls to track down where the meds were, why they were delivered to the old address, and how to get this straightened out.

This is an admonition to all of YOU, who have to call and speak with CSR's when things go wrong. Do not yell at them, do not curse them out or disrespect them. That's the best way to make sure it takes longer to solve your issue than if you are nice to them. They are very limited in what they are able to do.

My advice is always to be assertive, not aggressive. Make it clear to the CSR what the problem is, why you are upset and what you expect to happen. Let the CSR know you are upset at what is going on, not at them personally. Put yourself in their place. You do not have to insult or belittle the person, they are not resposible for the mistake and probably can't make it right. If they can't, ask for a supervisor. Usually, the supervisor has the authority to properly address the issue. If they don't, ask for their supervisor and so on until you reach someone with the authority to set things right.

My wife did run out of her most important medication for a couple of days. She was scared, upset and non-functional. I felt like I was a rawhide chew toy for a pit bull.

I finally got to a manager who listened to the recordings of my calls, heard that the original CSR started the entire chain of events by not deleting the old information when I told her to, and overnighted a new set of medications at no charge.

Here's the part I want to emphasize: The next day, I received a call from the Director of Operations for the company. We spent about 45 minutes discussing what went on, what worked and didn't work and my suggestions to how to improve communication and handle situations like this.

His response was he let the original CSR go, spoke with both managers and the other CSRs that I had interacted with to let them know where there was room for improvement and he was instituting a new training program and procedures for situations like this. He also gave me (I did not ask for this) a 3 month credit on the one critical medication my wife needs and his direct phone number for if this happens again.

Please remember this: No one is perfect, mistakes will be made by everybody. It is how you deal with and make the mistakes right that I will grade you. If you blow me off, you don't get my business anymore. You make the mistake right, I will keep doing business with you. Go go above and beyond making it right, I let everyone I know about you.

You can be anything you want to be on the Internet. Why so many people choose to be hurtful is beyond me.

Everyone should try to build up others around them as we travel through life, not tear them down. If I was in a fitness club and could encourage one person, it would be the overweight person struggling to walk on a treadmill. Because starting a change like that is incredibly hard.

The DNA that makes up each of us is the “program” that we are built from. If the information from a single person was expressed as a computer application, the program would take up gigabytes, if not terabytes. Everything that we physically are, from our sex, build and hair color all the way down to if we are more likely to be susceptible to certain kinds of cancer. There are so many combinations that it is very likely that genetically, you are unique from everyone who has or who will ever live.
Despite all that “programming,” we still have the ability to change some things  about us. We might be prone to be overweight, or depression or anything else. We can compensate (not fix) some things about us. Lifestyle or behavioral changes that are within our ability to change us physically to some extent.

YOU ARE YOU and nobody else. We need to learn that we should always try to be better than who we were yesterday. You should be what you want to be, not what another person thinks you should be. Because you will never satisfy other people. You can only satisfy your own expectations of who you want to be.

This video is an example of the “you can’t please everybody” point.

As of yesterday afternoon, all the paperwork has been signed and everything is ready to go. Next Thursday I will be Assistant Director – Communications for Alpha Omega Veterans Services.

I get to do many things, including run the social media aspect for this wonderful organization. I am honored that I will be helping my battle brothers and sisters through their struggles.

I can’t tell you how much this means to me. I have been through so much in the past years of my life. If you read my archives, you can see some of it. I would not have made it without the help of my support network, especially my beautiful blushing bride of 26 years. It is now my turn to help others who also struggle with just making it to the end of the day.

There is a difference between can’t and won’t.

Before the next time you say you “can’t” do something, consider this:

Dashrath Manjhi lived in a poor village in India. His village was less than a mile from a neighboring village that had a lot better services (schools, doctors, etc.) The problem was… that “mile” took you over a mountain. so, the people of Dashrath’s village could either climb over the mountain (very dangerous), or walk 45 miles around the mountain. When his wife was injured trying to go over the mountain, Dashrath decided he had to do something about it.

So, he picked up a hammer and chisel and took after the mountain.

Every morning, he started pounding away at the mountain at 4 AM, until 8 AM, whereupon he went and worked in the fields to support his family.

For twenty-two years. Over eight thousand days.

And he succeeded.

If a single man can carve his way through a mountain with hand tools, I don’t want to hear you “can’t” do something.

I hate passive-aggressiveness. Hate it, hate it, hate it. That being said, there are times when this is the proper course of action. I have an acquaintance who has been deemed "extremely mission-critical" by his boss. This man is so essential to business, he is to show up to work if he is sick, where his boss will make the determination if he is sick enough or not. If he is "sick enough," he will be sent to the doctor to be treated and for a note. Abraham Lincoln, in Star Trek TOS episode The Savage Curtain remarked, "You should always give your opponent what he wants, just not the way he wants it." So, I had the following thought exercise.

DISCLAIMER: I do not advocate the actual execution of this suggested course of action, or any variation thereof. First of all, you should create a situation where you have to stand over your boss. Be scratching your scalp constantly during this situation. When the boss asks about your scratching, remark, "Sorry I didn't tell you. My daughter came home with head lice and we are all infested." So, boss man panics, as he thinks you have been dumping lice on him. He orders you to the doctor. You return the next day with the following note, signed by your doctor:

To whom it may concern: Let me be plain and say upfront that you are an idiot. You have unnecessarily exposed my patients to this condition, and unnecessarily exposed your employee and his family to serious illnesses from my other patients when his condition could be treated at home with OTC treatments in order for him to obtain this note. You have also wasted my time, taking it away from my other patients to draft this note. You may, therefore, consider this an invoice from my office for the amount of $100 for my time to draft this doctors note. This is further notice if I have to repeat this unnecessary action for any of your employees, I will invoice your company $500 per letter. Thank you. Have a nice day.

By the way, I used to read George Hayduke way back when.

I have 731 songs in my iPhone. The artists go from Adam Ant to ZZ Top. Glenn Miller, Jethro Tull, Bib & Rich, Coolio, Kid Rock and a ton more. I listen to these songs for many reasons. To laugh, to cry, to be inspired and more. I have one Recovery Song. This one song reminds me just how often I stared into Deaths face and I was able to walk away. I am extremely lucky I am still here. I truly believe God has kept me here for a reason. I try to live every day as an inspiration to others. It warms me whenever someone else tells me, "Because of your example, I didn't quit." Here is that song.

Please come now I think I'm falling
I'm holding to all I think is safe
It seems I found the road to nowhere
And I'm trying to escape
I yelled back when I heard thunder
But I'm down to one last breath
And with it let me say
Let me say
Hold me now I'm six feet from the edge and I'm thinking
That maybe six feet
Ain't so far down I'm looking down now that it's over
Reflecting on all of my mistakes
I thought I found the road to somewhere
Somewhere in His grace
I cried out heaven save me
But I'm down to one last breath
And with it let me say
Let me say
Hold me now
I'm six feet from the edge and I'm thinking
That maybe six feet
Ain't so far down
Sad eyes follow me
But I still believe there's something left for me
So please come stay with me
'Cause I still believe there's something left for you and me
For you and me
For you and me
Hold me now I'm six feet from the edge and I'm thinking
That maybe six feet
Ain't so far down

To me (YMMV), the singer believes he is at the end, and while he's fighting for life, he's thinking that giving up wouldn't be that bad. Despite that, he still fights.