Today is Pi Day. It if has been a few years since you were in school, let me give a quick refresher. Pi is a constant math symbol that shows the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. It comes out to be 3.14159. Today is 3/14. Get it. It is Pi Day.
The Accountant and I celebrated Pi day by eating Shepherd’s Pie.
Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
–Ralph Waldo Emerson
When I was 15, I decided to write a story about the next twenty years of my life. It was a fascinating story with a month by month description of what I would do and who I would be. I am twenty years in the future. I pulled out my teenaged version of the future and laughed and then cried. Here are 4/105 predictions in my teenaged version of my life story.
I had a bit of an obsession with Russia when I was a teen. The plan was to serve a church mission there and then later go back and work at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow.
Verdict: Nope. I don’t speak Russian. I didn’t serve a mission for my church and I’ve never worked for an Embassy.
2. Fix the light switch in the living room
The light switch in my parent’s living room was wired the wrong way. When you switched the knob up, the light turned off. When you switched the knob down, the light turned on. It bothered me enough that I put it as one of those things that I must do in my life.
Verdict: My parents did get that light fixed. Twenty years later, I am still annoyed by little things when they don’t work the way they are designed to work.
3. Army nurse
I had it all planned out. I was going to spend four years in the Army as a nurse. There were pages and pages in my life history about my heroic deeds and charitable acts. I was going to be the next Florence Nightingale. Along the way, I would meet a kind, rich and dashing young man from Great Britain. We would have five children together and live on a lovely estate while he managed the family’s chocolate business.
Verdict: My kind and dashing husband is not British. He did have more money in his bank account than me when we got married. So, in a sense I married a rich man. I’m happy with my choice. Did I ever become a nurse? No, but I still think Florence Nightingale was a cool person.
4. Win two Academy awards
One award wasn’t good enough so I gave myself two awards. I was going to earn the Best Screenplay and Best Actress. I wrote very a nice speech to accept the award.
Verdict: I haven’t written a screenplay or won any Academy awards. I was an extra in a really dumb independent movie about a man that discovers an ancient device during archeology dig. He brings the device back to his college campus which makes everybody go crazy. I told you it was a silly movie. You can see me for about five seconds. I’m the archeologist digging in the dirt next to the man who finds the device. The film went straight to DVD.
Come back tomorrow. I’m going to introduce my next challenge to the world.
My Research
Since I’ve started my little challenges, I have been trying to read more about nutrition and healthy living. I’ve found that a lot of sites try to sale you their vitamins and shakes. It can be hard to separate the real nutrition information from the sales pitch. I’m not against supplements. In fact, I’ve taken vitamins myself for many years. I’m just looking for a site that gives me some solid information to use in my journey to improve my health. After much searching, I’ve found my health web site. Thank you to the dear folks at Harvard. I love your public health web site. It is great. The Accountant and I have tried a few of the recipes on the site.
I was especially encouraged by the research page that said even small changes like sleeping more and cutting down on soda can cut your risk for diseases. If you need me, I’m going to be taking the advice of the educated Harvard folks. I’m going to bed. Sweet Dreams.
I got paid to climb stairs today. I found 87 cents! Two pennies, three dimes, two quarters and a nickel. May be some one had a hole in their pocket. It was kind of fun to find money. Today it paid to climb stairs. 
Today we got brave and climbed one of the tallest buildings in town. It was 17 flights up and 17 flights down. 
My legs are kind of sore. Who knew that climbing stairs could make one’s thighs throb? I’ve read that things always seem worse before they get better. I am hopeful that by the end of this challenge my legs will not hurt as much when climbing stairs.
my 13 day challenge 