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You see, whilst attempting to listen to my teachers, I found myself cruising off to the Bahamas, putting duel exhaust on my ’66 Mustang, dating the hottest hottie in school, or slapping a game winning home run.  With all due respect to Duckie, Mr. D, Bubba,  Leeeeeeeeeee, The Frau or any of the other gifted educators I was truly blessed to spend quality time with each day, I frankly had a really hard time staying plugged in.

Anyway, I decided I would undertake this experiment to measure my attention span.  Since I figured I was an average person, if I could measure my attention span, it would serve as a worldwide proxy for all the average Joes or Gradock’s out there.  The test was quite simple.  I would go to class, write down the time the lesson began, and the moment I started my cruise to the Bahamas, I would check out the clock again, and write down the time, do a little subtraction and voila, I would know my attention span.   All well and good, but I realized quite quickly that by the time I realized I was daydreaming, I was either half way to the Bahamas,  I had rebuilt the carburetor, or if I was really lucky, ahem, saying goodnight to Miss Hotinsky…

After many unsuccessfully attempts to crack the code of my attention span, I did finally catch myself at the precise moment I was pushing back from the dock.  And then, a few weeks later, was successful again.  The result…. Twelve and a half minutes.  But you already knew that already.

This morning when I got up I was chewing over this whole bit of news I’ve been hearing about the House and Senate reconciling their two tomes; the nearly 2,000 page House Bill and the 2074 page Senate bill.  Besides scratching my head and other body parts, over their continued desire to frost those turds, I started to wonder, what was the longest book ever written?  Then I set out to do some more scientific discovery.

First I decided to count the words in the Senate Bill.  Easy enough; highlight the document, copy it into word, do a word count and presto.  Well I started copying that pig and after 10 minutes (approaching my maximum attention span) I bailed and copied everything I had into word which represented a whopping 397 pages, 114,000 words, or about 18% of the document.  I’ll spare you the higher algebra, but by my count the total document is about 594,000 words.  Applying the same math to the House Bill, assuming they cram about as many words on a page as the Senate, their bill is close to 570,000 words.  Collectively, nearly 1.2 million words.

According to Wikipedia the longest novel written in either the Latin or Cyrillic alphabet, is a 2.1 million word snoozer entitled Madeleine and Georges de Scudéry.  Never heard of it?  Me neither.  I perused the list of the top 15  loooooongest longest novels to determine if there were any on the list that average folks like me might recognize.  There were three.  War and Peace, topping the word scale at 560,000 words (never read it),  Les Miserables weighing in at a slightly lighter 513,000 words (saw the play), and Atlas Shrugged splitting the middle at 540,000 words (on my reading list but after writing this blog, maybe not).

The average American has an attention span of 12.5 minutes.  The average American with a high deductible health plan and a health savings account needs a couple of hours just to begin to understand the benefits of their insurance and tax advantaged HSAs.  The nearly 600,000 word piece of healthcare sausage created by the Senate is anything but average.  In fact, to most average folks, it’s downright insulting.  And here they are trying to do the Vulcan document meld with the Senate and House Bills.

Ladies and Gents.  If you can’t explain the sucker in 12.5 minutes to the average Joe, you lose his or her attention, and more importantly, their confidence.  ‘Nuff said.  Well, almost; if you have made it all the way to the end of this blog, congratulations, you just read 732 words.

It is my observation that individuals who do not take responsibility, tend to have been in positions in their lives for which little responsibility has been required. 

Blame is something generally heaped on others whereas responsibility is something generally heaped upon oneself.  Blame is about dumping.  Responsibility is about seizing.  Blame is about taking care of oneself.  Responsibility is about taking care of others.  Blame is selfish.  Responsibility is selfless.

I have to say I am getting a bit weary of our President pointing the finger of blame.  Everyone knows that all the problems of America are not his fault.  Even if he didn’t remind us at every bend in the road.

Do you think the President’s focus on blame is a function of his past?  A past in which he has had to take little responsibility?  

One of the big knocks on him during his campaign was his inexperience and how that might affect his ability to lead.   I think for the President, the first step in his quest to become a great leader is to grab and yank the reins of responsibility.

The job’s not easy.  But didn’t anyone tell him that when he campaigned like a bad assed champion to get it?  When it comes to great leadership nobody cares who caused the problems.  They only care about the person willing to take responsibility, the person who will seize responsibility and get ‘em fixed.

 “… From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” Luke 12:48 (NIV)

Or if that does not compute, two words: Man Up!

A few years back I cracked the scales at my doctor’s office at a prodigious two hundred and eight pounds.  For the past couple of years my weight has hovered between 173 and 178 pounds. 

Part of my motivation to shed the tire was that I had lived a Dilbertian existence in corporate America for 18 years.  The most exercise I got at work was walking too and from the parking lot to my office.  About the only running I did was running my big fat mouth.  I was tired of feeling tired.  One day in the fall before I stepped outside of corporate America, I was out raking leaves and I had to sit down because I thought I was going to drop dead.

Before I left my job, I bellied up to my employer’s smorgasbord health plan buffet and had a full blown physical.  The leaf raking thing scared the crap out of me and I wanted to be sure if I started exercising for real, I wouldn’t drop dead for real.  My doctor confirmed I was fat and lazy but the rest of me was in fine shape if not a little round.  Prior to any dramatic changes in your lifestyle, I highly recommend a visit to the doc, to make sure you are well enough to really take control of your health.

You can pay huge money for all kinds of diet advice, but let me tell you, advice won’t lose you an ounce of blubber.   But you will lose weight if you can wrap your brain around cutting your caloric intake in half. 

You don’t need to go out and buy and special calorie counting cards or gizmos.  You don’t need to go out and buy special foods (unless you want to).  You don’t need to read the calories on the side of every box and can at the supermarket.

What you do need to do is to cut every meal in half.  Fix half as much.  If you are dining out buy one meal and split it with a friend or significant other.  Not only will you cut your calories in half, but you will save 50% on your food bill.

That’s your starting point.  You won’t starve.  You won’t be forced to eat crappy stuff you don’t like.  You won’t have to keep a log.  You will know in your head, each time you sit down to eat if you are following the plan or not.   The other important advice to go along with this is drink lots of water.  Substitute it for anything with sugar in it when you can and you will cut down your calories even more.

Once you get into the habit of eating less, then you can begin to focus on eating better.  Eat a little fruit, a few vegetables.  They won’t kill, you and they beat the snot out of that stuff the dude on Man vs. Wild eats on the Discovery Channel.

Lastly if you want to really start feeling better, get some exercise.  Make that a habit too.

In summary Elvis, here were/are the benefits for me:

• I feel better
• I lost weight
• I look trimmer if not better (my face, sadly, is one only a mother could love, so losing weight did nothing for me in that department)
• I cut my food bill significantly
• I don’t crap as much which means I have more time to do other things (like exercise)
• I sleep better
• When I went to get life insurance, all of my vitals tests put me in a health range that lowered my insurance premium
• I became far more aware of what goes in my body and over time made some changes in what I ate in addition to how much I ate
• I changed some bad habits into good ones

If you read all of this, good for you.  Now go take the first step baby.

I’m clueless as to the direction of the country, but I did pick up a few new Spanish phrases.

I live in Atlanta, Georgia where we have this little transportation outfit called MARTA which began rail service back in the 1970s.  It’s a government entity that looks and feels like it is still operating off a strategic plan, that was probably all aces 35 years ago….  It is a government operation, and I’m pretty sure it has never been able to pay for itself through pure ridership and advertising.  I’m guessing local sales tax and federal money keep them trains a comin.

Last night, having arrived home from Newark,  I headed to the MARTA station to catch the train home.   As I waited 20 minutes in a dark dreary station for the train to show up and then leave the station, was informed I would have to transfer trains due to a reduced evening schedule, was pan handled on two separate occasions, all the while snuggled up with about 100 bedraggled  strangers, and was ultimately deposited in another dreary station, I was not left scratching my head as to some of the reasons why MARTA is fiscally challenged. 

I did notice a sign announcing a public meeting to solicit ideas on how to address some of their issues.  I can only imagine the enthusiastic crowd that’s going to schlep down to the MARTA offices for that meeting to help solve all their problems.    Maybe if they are giving away free coffee…. My advice; “Go LOOK in the mirror people!” 

The problem with Mr. Obama and his Starfleet Command is its government approach to government.   Don’t you think that if some smart company or investor thought for a minute they could make a buck off of light rail, they would have done it already??  Warren Buffet could scratch a check in a heartbeat if thought it was viable.   He could add that to his choo choo collection.

I read that Obama wants to drop $8-$13 Billion to fund high-speed light rail, and I’m thinking for my family of 4 we spend $3,000 per year on a high deductible health plan with an HSA which includes well care.   A little quick math and I’m figuring with $8B we could cover the health care nut for about  2.6 million families or over 10 million lives.  Now, I’m not proposing the government buy health insurance for 10 million people; there are just better ways to wiz away my borrowed tax dollars.

Obama’s government approach to government is kind of like when your mamma gives your kid a $100 gift card to Wal-Mart, and the boy promptly goes and blows it on $100 worth of Yugioh cards.  He then trys to convince you it’s a good investment!  The purchase feels pretty good for about 5 minutes and then the reality of stupidity begins to set in.  The only difference with government is that it can even rationalize reality.  They will always make  believe it was a good investment, even when the cards are dog-eared and tired.

Here’s an idea.  How about a little bit of Un-Government?  Now there’s a little change I could believe in.  If President Obama could grasp that concept, who knows where he could lead this country?  That might even be statue-worthy.  Definitely a cut above an installation at Madame Tussauds.

So what about this light rail thing?  Maybe I am living in a cocoon with my only perspective being a local public transportation system that has given me a jaded perspective, but I don’t think I’m off by much.   Change? My butt!  Simply a government approach to government.  Can someone please pass me the Lysol?