38. That much closer to 40.

Today's my birthday. I'm torn between heading out to the park with a notepad in hand to sit and contemplate this past year and what I want to accomplish this year, or playing Mechwarrior II until I puke. Honestly, it's a toss-up at this point. I'll probably do both.

I've always loved having a Halloween birthday. I have great memories of the birthday parties my parents threw for me back in Angleton, where we'd invite my whole elementary school class, everyone would dress up, and we'd play games and cause trouble. That was a ton of fun! My 40th birthday will be on a Friday night...maybe we can do that again. ;-) It's always fun to have Frankenstein, Dracula, and other costumed ghouls involved in a competitive sack race!

Remember the old bow and arrow sets with the suction cups on the arrows? One year, Mom attached balloons to the wall in our 'toy room', and stuck nails into the suction cups so we could pop the balloons...that was cool! Maybe we can use throwing knives next time...

In looking at this past year, I'm pretty pleased in many areas. My school is doing well, we've got a fabulous group of assistant instructors and a great family atmosphere of which I'm very proud. Our Monkey is doing well in his new kindergarten. My fabulous wife's new job has finally taken a turn for the better after a rough start, and she's also lost over 30 pounds since the summer. All in all, it's been a pretty decent year.

As I get closer to 40, the value of discipline becomes more and more apparent. I can't eat like I did when I was younger...if I eat junk, I feel junky almost immediately. If I don't train, I lose speed, strength, and stamina right away. If I don't exercise my brain, I suddenly can't remember where my pants are...and I'm wearing them. So it seems that I'll focus this year on maintaining the habits necessary to keep me healthy, strong, and moving in a positive direction. And maybe set some goals in which I can become emotionally involved. Training just for training is great, but I want to accomplish something this year...I just don't know what, yet.

So today, I think I'll play, contemplate, teach class (only the early one), train, eat a fabulous pho lunch, and then we'll take Monkey out to Trick or Treat somewhere...just another birthday for me.