...

DAY 75!

Update: Tuesday, 10-May-2005 9:32 AM

I must end a conversation that I had yesterday about sleep: For an entrepreneur this is one of the most important elements, next to good food and diet.

As I have said, when reaching personal success -everything is important, and food, water and rest are at the top of the list. I think I left out exercise --that too.

I have personally noted that on "bad days" I tend to eat very poorly. I am sure that it is caused by stress and when stressed I tend to eat a lot of carbs and sugars.

Not a good idea, because the added calories end up making the situation worse. I bring this up because you'll need to keep this in mind. Improving all of your lots in life will end up causing a lot of headache at times, especially if you go the business route.

Anyway, it can be handled. I try to get plenty of walks, and always eat right. Well, not always -about 90% I would say. That's not bad. I calculated that I drink around 15 to 18 glasses was water a day. Mostly as tea.

I think I have some sort of alcohol -almost daily, as well in the form of wine.

It's not uncommon that I drink 3 or 4 liters of water at times, especially after one of those hikes while on vacation. I figure that 75% of my body weight is made up of water or liquid and drinking water is "a good thing" as Martha would say. Martha, btw, is a domestic diva in the USA. Although she's a bit out of the 'lime light' after a stock trade that she 'botched'.

Well, out of this thought track and to today's stuff.

Today I got started by going to cnn.com and reading up on what happened yesterday and then venturing on to the financial paper, Investors Business Daily.

Then I read this about gambling. I don't like to read about gambling winning, as I think that sends the wrong message about hard work and success. The only way to win at gambling I have found out is to own some of the establishments stock. That always seems to work.

A short time after that I got this through email:

My Name is Mr. Richard Maduako, a credit officer with one of the leading (Finance Trust Houses) here in Nigeria- ZENITH INTERNATIONAL BANK. I had been accounts officer to one of our highly valued customers MR. ANDREAS SCHRANNER from Munich, Germany who was a sub contractor to a highly reputable oil servicing firm here in Nigeria until may 2000 when he travelled to his country on leave but never returned. He died along with his entire family in July 2000 in a plane crash (CONCORDE AF4590) SEE WEBSITE.

Well, this is one of those '409' or so numbered scams coming out of Nigeria. This guy seems to be writing from the UK. Anyway, Richard hit the low point in these emails as he takes the deaths of the Concorde passengers to carry out his scam. This guy gets my 'worm of the day' award. Good job.

I shifted gears from the negative and went on to the "Leaders and Success" column in the Investors Business Daily. That always gives a good start to the morning no matter what type of day it is. I went on to read about Goose Goslin. Often we read, watch and hear about the home-run hitters. However, a neighbor of mine in Bethesda, Maryland reminded me that it's usually the single base hitters that have the long and successful careers in the game of base ball. There are the guys that deliver day in, day out and just keep on going.

Goose seems to be such a player.

This was said about him in the paper (IBD) -10th of May 2005:

Growing up at the start of the 20th century, Leon Allen Goslin did what many boys did to pass the time:
He played baseball.
...
His competitive fire also burned brightly. Heading into the last game of the 1928 season, Goslin was running neck and neck for the league batting title with Heinie Manush, an outfielder for the St. Louis Browns. The Browns happened to be the Senators’ opponents that day. It came down to the last at-bat. If Goslin didn’t bat, he had the batting title sewn up. If he batted and made an out, Manush would win it. Manager Bucky Harris offered to lift Goslin for a pinch-hitter. He elected to bat anyway, got his hit and won the coveted batting crown.

--above from IBD.

That is how glory is earned. It's not a case of the safe way out, but a 'no guts, no glory' one at that.

From there I went on to test our network and it seems that the minor items that need to be corrected are taking a lot of time. And time is something precious that we have little of before it is launched.

I have made another deadline for getting the BETA version up and going, with some incentives to make sure we meet the target.

I hope that will help as continued delays just don't end up helping a successful launch of a product.

We have completed a lot of the items and it's just the last 5% of the items that are left and it seems endless getting those done.

Once again, a lot is adding up and I need to keep on top of it to make sure that I don't drown in it over the coming months. I don't plan to...

Back again... Tuesday, 10-May-2005 11:05 PM

One of the unexpected benefits of my planning and constant self improvement dividends has been that I am now planning ahead a lot more than I used to.

Instead of working from a delayed perspective, I am actually keeping up with the tasks and getting them done, one at a time and at a reasonable pace.

This has been a problem in the past, but, often when I don't have too much work. When I have way too much work I seem to get it done, perhaps, with my back against the wall I get it done.

Over the past few months that has not been the case, but still I have stayed up-to-date and got a lot of items done.

Well, tomorrow is just mid-week and a major part of what's left will be completed at Maxsimo.com this week, so I am looking forward to testing it.

Now it's late. Got to go. Sam out.