…Age Just recently, as many readers know, I’ve renewed my focus on my health. I am not participating in any type of fad diet, nor using any diet “program.” I’m not paying into CrossFit, Isometrix, Tone-ex, yada yada. I’m using that ancient and under-appreciated method that has been proven over millennia: I’m eating cleaner and…
This morning I saw a quote that said, “Even bad days have an expiration date of 24 hours.” The editor in me wondered if a time limit was a date and then I realized I was missing the point. The point is that even bad days have a limit to them; they only last a…
Some years back when I was responsible for fleet maintenance for my police agency, we kept track of the service life of our patrol vehicles by how many miles they had on them. Another agency I knew of tracked the service life of their patrol vehicles according to service hours. We scheduled maintenance according to…
This entry is being used to announce a new section and effort here on my webpage: a section dedicated to fitness and nutrition and the documentation of my effort to increase my quality (and longevity) of life through use of the same. Welcome to Frankly Fit – the new section.
I happen to belong to an organization that requires a “belief in deity” to apply for membership. Now very carefully read this: I didn’t say “a belief in God,” or any other specifically named deity, religious icon, etc. I said, it requires a belief in deity. I know people who have expressed a desire to…
“It’ll be just like shooting fish in a barrel.” We here that phrase used all the time. It’s just a figure of speech. What does it mean? Something will be easy to do. Why is shooting fish in a barrel easy? Because you have a “target rich environment.” For you folks who have never been…
My family once owned a dog that we named ThunderStorm and just called Storm. He was a chocolate Labrador from a big family and, full grown, weighed about 100 pounds. The odd thing we discovered about him, from the earliest days we had him as a puppy, was that he loved to go out and…
The one thing we can all count on is change. It’s the only constant in life. Every day… something is going to change. We have no choice, if we’re going to live successful lives, but to adapt to the change and keep on. This is perhaps not as evident anywhere else as it is in…
Nine days ago – as I type this – a single gunman went into Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida and shot 31 people. He killed 17 and wounded 14 others. Unlike so many other active shooters, he didn’t commit suicide but was arrested. He was charged with 17 counts of premeditated murder….
Have you ever noticed that some of your friends or family never seem quite as stressed or lacking in control of a given situation as others? Have you ever wondered why? What makes them so special? How come they never seem to sweat when something goes sideways? Here are a few reasons why they might…
In today’s computer age, days where you can’t look around without seeing someone on their “smart” phone, and times of everyone being connected nearly full time, the word “hack” has come to take on a whole new meaning. It is essentially used to mean “something that makes your life easier or an easier and faster…
So, I received a private message on Facebook from a gentleman asking, “What qualifies you to give advice on life to anyone?” I had to think about this. It’s a good question. I found myself wondering if he has a point? What DOES qualify me to give advice on anything to anyone? For that matter,…
I was sitting in my family room this evening watching my favorite television show (not that I watch much TV) and I noticed that my son was sitting at the coffee table playing with some small action figures; not the posable kind, but a futuristic version of the little green army men most of us…
A while ago I wrote an article that brought great response about how some training circumstances and tools used by our military services today may actually be teaching our soldiers to die. What I mean to say is that the training may be conditioning them to expect their own death. In recent months I’ve been…
It is an observable oddity of the American society that we sometimes act or behave exactly opposite to what is in our best interests. I know a great many people who act oddly when they are falling in love, but that’s not really a surprise is it? Some people say that a soldier who sacrifices…
MAN: an adult male person, as distinguished from a boy or a woman. A male having qualities considered typical of men or appropriately masculine. A male human endowed with qualities, such as strength, considered characteristic of manhood. (Definitions provided by www.dictionary.com) I was a little surprised to find more than 26 definitions for the word “man” when…
As I stood amongst some peers last week, bragging without shame about my children, one of the fellows kindly listening to me made the following statement: “The hope of our country is in our children, and if we don’t drastically change the societal message they’re getting, our future looks dim.” My very first reaction was to absolutely…
As the faithful readers of the Blackwater Tactical Weekly know I once spent two weeks in New Orleans on contract to Blackwater. I’m home now and have had a couple of days to contemplate the gear I was issued to use while in N.O.. Certainly, the conditions varied from comfortable to, ah, less-than-comfortable, but the…
When I went into the Army as a Military Policeman in 1982, I was issued half a tent, otherwise called “a shelter half”. When I asked what I was supposed to do with half a tent I was told, “Find a buddy that has a matching half.” Together we made a whole tent. When I…
Near the end of every calendar year… or in the first few days of a new year… huge numbers of people make resolutions with the goal of improving their life. Some of those resolutions are very specific and equally unrealistic. For example, after someone has been a cigarette smoker for years (if not decades), they…