Basketball tournaments are here. Good luck to all of the area teams. It’s never fun though when you play a team in the tournament that you’ve played two or three times in the regular season. I guess I just like all of the area teams to do well and not meet each other in the tournament.

When I heard about the news of Whitney Houston’s death last weekend, I was, like a lot of other people, shocked. “Wow…Whitney Houston dead at the age of 48. That’s pretty young”. And it is. And I thought about how her life was, and I’m sure that a lot of people would have been willing to trade their life for hers. Fame…stardom…wealth. Who wouldn’t want that? And with all that comes the part of her life that most of us never heard about. The drug and alcohol abuse, the crumbled marriage to Bobby Brown, the strained relationships she had, the hidden demons inside her, etc. I began to read posts on facebook over the weekend and how people were viewing her death. Some were of remorse, some were a bit more personal and mean. Everyone has an opinion and I’m ok with that. But then the posts that I saw from a third angle really opened my eyes. Do we ever give a fallen soldier this much attention? How about a police officer who is killed in the line of duty just “doing their job”? Or the firefighter who dies in a house fire saving the lives of people trapped inside the house? Why don’t we recognize these people more than what they receive? Is it because Whitney Houston was famous? If that’s the case, that’s sad. I’m not saying that her death wasn’t tragic…it was. But she had it all, and took drugs and drowned in a bathtub. How she chose to live her life was her business. All I’m saying is that maybe we should give people who lose their life keeping us safe a little more recognition than what we do.

Never under-estimate the ability to get enough sleep. The older I get the more I look forward to an afternoon nap every once in a while. When I was younger, my thought was that “I will sleep more when I’m old.” Crap! It’s funny how you’re body plays tricks on you. Your mind tells you one thing that your body just laughs at you about. It’s like playing sports with the kids. My mind tells me I can do this, no problem and my body says “I dare you!” Why are we like that? We all seem to slow down as we age, yet time goes faster and faster. And when you’re a kid, we are in such a hurry and time seems to drag. I wonder when it was at that point in life when it was equal? I can’t remember…I think I need a nap!

How are you with New Years resolutions? Me…not so much. However, I have tried to cut back on drinking several cans of soda a day. I’m limiting myself to just one per day (although I could use a few more on some days). It’s not as difficult as I thought, at least not yet. In the past, it has been no big deal for me to have three or four per day. I mean I know they are diet sodas, so I’m just fooling myself, right? I read on line today that drinking a lot of soda pop can cause obesity and heart disease. So I’m makinig an effort to just have one per day and drink more water. My thought is that it will slow down the obesity and heart disease, eh? I’ll let you know how I’m doing later.