Chess

My oldest daughter will be five at the end of October and last night was the first time we played a game of chess with all the pieces.. yes, the knights were included.

She started learning to play chess about two weeks ago. Before starting the process I did some research to see how you get started. With all the different pieces I wondered how she would pick it all up. My research told me that I needed to start with just a couple of pieces on the board, and slowly build. So in the first game we played my daughter had the queen and I had the eight pawns. To win she had to take all my pawns before one of my pawns made it to the end of the board. The other important factor is that she had to win every game.

So we progressed from the queen takes pawns games to adding bishops and rooks to the board. Then she had to checkmate my king with the queen and two rooks. I showed her how pieces are protected and pinned.

Bit by bit she has picked it up, playing for 20-30 minutes a night, three or four nights a week.

So last night when we played with all the pieces it was quite a moment. I still talk through the moves with her and help her see different options, but she gets it, and I can see that she's thinking about her strategy.

And of course, last night she won again!

Sold!

On Saturday night we had some friends over for dinner, and it's amazing how some alcohol can change the complexion of a conversation! The inhibitions are removed, the guard drops. This friend of mine, whom I've known for about four years shared his true delight at my paintings and expressed interest in owning some.

I said "absolutely! I'd love to sell you some art."

After about half an hour of deliberations I had sold three paintings, and it felt good to see them go to a new home and be appreciated.

It struck me that often we don't express our thoughts to those that can make a difference. Although my friend had been interested in buying my paintings for a while, he had never asked, and I guess since I had never broached the topic, we never had the conversation.

Thanks to Baileys and coffee, we did.

In the coming weeks I will be posting pictures of my paintings for sale. Please feel free to email me at matthew@pagehanify.com if you are interested in purchasing any.

2:04:00

The race was run. I made it! Training since February 1st for this day, and now I'm stiff and sore. I finished in an official time of 2 hours 4 minutes exactly. That placed me 1,392nd in a field of 2,836. That's also a personal best by around five minutes so I was ecstatic about that. Didn't hit "the wall" and felt good all the way.

I was proud of myself for a number of reasons.

1. I never thought of myself as a runner and hadn't run more than 100m in over 10 years.
2. I set myself the goal in January to run the half-marathon and followed through.
3. I came into the race very prepared having run over 20km twice already in May.
4. I didn't hit "the wall" which is a sign I was prepared.
5. I had a poor preparation given that I got sick on Tuesday and was still feeling less than 100% on race morning.
6. I managed my race well and started slowly, ending with a PB!

Now I set my sights on the Canmore half marathon - September 12th...

Click on image to enlarge.

My First Run.

I've just come back from my first "long run" as part of my training for the half-marathon (21.1km) at the end of May. Now it's not that long, but I have to start somewhere. Harold and I went for a 4.69 km run along the Bow River and we completed it in 28:50, which has me at 2hr-11min pace for the half marathon. I'm setting the goal of the half marathon in 2 hours, so it's around the mark.

What is actually the best part of today is that this was my first run and my fitness is such that I performed well. Walking the 4.5km to and from work for the last 7 months would be the main contributor to that.

I'm excited about the start, and I'm encouraged now to take on greater challenges... who knows, maybe a marathon by the end of the year!

Setting the Goal

Today I registered for the Calgary Half Marathon on May 31st. I'm registering because it's part of my commitment to taking my fitness to the next level and challenging myself. I've never really considered myself a runner and so this will smash those false illusions.

I'm back!

It's been brought to my attention that this blog has become overrun with cobwebs and dust. I'm brushing all that aside and I'm back writing. There's no time like the present!

188.8 lbs

On October 3rd When I hit my goal weight a friend of mine said, "It's all well and good to hit your target, but it'll be interesting to see where you're at three months later."

Well, this morning I weighed in at 188.8 lbs, so I guess I'm still on track!

Living My Dream

I'm instructing a Dale Carnegie in Red Deer that stared last night. As I drove home at around 10pm, it was late and I was tired, but I was wired. The reason - I'm living my dream. It struck me that after years and years of doing something for someone else and getting little satisfaction, I am now doing what I've always dreamed of doing.

It's a great feeling, because I know so many people who dread going to work, but I love my work. My time is precious and I'm spending it the way I want to. Being out late until 10pm isn't ideal, but it doesn't feel like work.

When I think back to just over a year ago when I started taking the Dale Carnegie Course, I didn't think that a year later I would be working for them and training a class. In fact I know that when I sat in the class as a Marketing Manager, becoming a Corporate Trainer seemed like such a leap that I had no idea how I would get there. Now I realize that you don't necessarily need to see all the steps, so long as you can visualize the direction.

Life changes very quickly when you make it happen. I committed to doing whatever it would take to change my life and now, here I am. Anything's possible.

For friends...

On Sunday I spent 9 hours at a friend's place painting this mural on their two-year-old son's bedroom wall. They're expecting a second child in a few months and their son is moving into this room to make way for the new addition. The boy loves Thomas the Tank Engine and wanted this for his room, and with my painting experience and having also painted a mural for my own children's bedroom I was confident I could get the job done.

Amber, the boy's mother, helped me with the mural and we worked well together as a team. Though it was a lot of work and I was quite tired at the end of it all, it was very enjoyable and very satisfying.

I realise what an awesome gift I was able to give them and their son, because there will be years of enjoyment that they will get from the mural. It's amazing how a gift that took nine hours to give can create such a lasting enjoyment.

Those are the gifts that have tremendous value. What's interesting is that is cost me nothing, yet it has a lot more value than any gift we have given them or their son.

Time is valuable, when we value it. When we can do good things with our time and give our time to others we can have a huge effect on them.

What is also interesting is the positive feeling I now have from creating this for them, and the strengthening of our friendship as a result.

Orbs and stuff...

Last night after watching a video about orbs I decided to take some pictures outside and see what I would get. I have had orbs in my pictures before but never to the extent that I got last night... This is the brightest orb I've ever photographed. The photo was taken looking up at the cloudy sky. You would swear I was taking a photo of the moon, but it's an orb! You can see the colours on each side of the orb are different too. There is some "spirit mist" on the right. That white stuff that looks like fog or something was not there in the previous or subsequent photos.

If you zoom into the "spirit mist" at the bottom of the photograph you can see that it looks like a face. This photo is taken from my front door looking straight into the night sky. You can see the roof line of my house in the top right corner.

This was the second picture I took, and i was blown away by the "spirit mist"!

This one taken on the sidewalk in front of our house - a huge orb!

Here's some more spirit mist, when I took a picture of my friend Rob. Again, in the previous and subsequent pictures that were taken only seconds apart, the shot was clear. It's weird! I have never had this happen to my pictures before, but I've also never just taken dozens of photos one after the otehr looking for this either!

A TV Star

Our 3 1/2 month old daughter made her television debut on Saskatoon's CTV 6pm news on December 28th, 2007. Our friend is the Sports Announcer for CTV news and we watched the broadcast in the studio. Because Delilah had been so well behaved they decided to get her on at the very end. See the link below to watch it on You Tube.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=PgUrEJsXz54

If the link doesn't work for you go to http://www.youtube.com/ and search "Delilah CTV", and it will come up.

Happy New Year!

Christmas Party

A great time was had by all last night at the Dale CarnegieChjristmas Party, held at the Ranchmen's Club in downtown Calgary. I love it when I've an opportunity to put the old penguin suit on again!

Exhibited.

Today, some of my artwork went on display at the Second Cup cafe on 10th Street in the trendy neighbourhood of Kensington in Calgary's inner city. This is exciting because it's the first time I've been displayed at the Second Cup and it has a high traffic count. The works will be up for a month, and I hope to be displayed there in the future as well.

Prices for the works on display are as follows:

• Puzzle Pieces (2 x 36"x48") Acrylic on canvas $1495
• Skewed Landscape (24"x36") Acrylic on canvas $450
• The Kiss (24"x36") Acrylic on canvas $450
• The Hand of God (24"x36") Acrylic on canvas $450
• Morning Sunrise (24"x36") Mixed media on canvas $550
• The Sun and the Tree (24"x36") Acrylic with varnish on canvas $495

Depending on sales, the display will change over the month.

Happy Halloween!

As an Australian, I never celebrated Halloween - not for any religious reasons, but because Halloween is not part of the Australian culture... or should I say, the Australian retailers haven't worked out how lucrative it can be.

I must say that I was amazed when I first came to Canada how much the shops get involved with Halloween paraphernalia. Even Shoppers Drug Mart had an aisle dedicated.

But as a Canadian citizen I choose to get involved, and especially since we now have children, i can see it being a lot of fun for them too.

Every year I've been carving pumpkins, and this year I carved Arnold Schwarzenegger...

Then, tonight for the very first time ever I went trick-or-treating. Yes, I'm in my thirties and I trick-or-treated for the first time!! I went with my daughter Vienna, who celebrated her 2nd birthday on October 29th. She went as a bear and I carried the bag of goodies.

We didn't teach her trick or treat, so she said "please" with her little hands outstretched, "thank you" (which sounds more like "fafu") when she received the goodies, and "roar" on cue when the people asked what she was.

It was awesome!

I must say that I always looked at Halloween as a money grab for the shops and another time to unnecessarily spend money, but I had so much fun with Vienna that I now think it should be a part of every child's upbringing.

Weight Gain!!

It's amazing how quickly children grow! Our new daughter Delilah weighed in at a tick over eight pounds when she was born. 32 days later she's a whopping eleven pounds. That's a 37% weight gain in just a month! And unlike most women, she hasn't gained it in her thighs and bum, it seems to have all gone into her chubby little cheeks!

I am Canadian

At around 11:30am on September 21st, 2007 I officially became a Canadian citizen! Hurray!

The Greatest Lesson of All

So often these days people rate their level of success by a few key criteria - job position, annual income, size of house, location of house, size of television, value of car(s) etc. Success for many is represented by what you can see they own.

For me success equals happiness. So, success at work is happiness at work. Personal success means happiness at home. I recently heard a definition for success that I liked, and it goes something like this...

"Success is waking up in the morning eager to go to work, being excited to return home at the end of the day and being welcome at both places."

Right now I'm in the middle of a seven-week break from working. I call myself semi-retired, although I will start working again in October. It has been an awesome time because it has given me time to spend with the family, and fully recharge my batteries for work, and rediscover my hunger to succeed in a professional capacity that had slowly dwindled over the last few years.

Being at home has also allowed me to be more hands on as a parent, and again a great learning experience. Children have the knack of highlighting weaknesses and make you realize how people of ever age have a habit of behaving childishly.

Many people have been asking us whether Vienna, our 22 month old daughter, is feeling misplaced or displaced with Delilah's arrival. We have heard many horror stories from parents whose first child gets very upset by the arrival of the younger sibling. Where the first child was once the star attraction, he or she, through no fault of their own, gets relegated to be the warm-up act.

Actually Vienna seems to be doing very well with the adjustments. We have been reinforcing from the very beginning that this is Vienna's baby. That seems to have given her ownership of her new sister and made her feel more responsible for helping and being a good "big sister".

Her behaviour is similar to that of adults whose lives are suddenly changed at work or home. If they aren't supported and given the appropriate recognition, they often times lose interest and if the feelings are widespread enough in an organization that would mean a serious deterioration in morale.

Vienna has been very helpful and likes to assist one of the parents in diaper changing for Delilah. Vienna will fetch and unfold the clean diaper and dispose of the dirty one for us.

Vienna is also often on hand to give supportive kisses to Delilah.

It has been a lot of fun over the past two weeks having a new baby, but also seeing Vienna as a big sister. Vienna surprises us constantly with her understanding and maturity.

Having children is the greatest lesson of all.

As Cute As Ever!

Over the past couple of weeks a lot of the focus has been on our new daughter Delilah. However, it is so important that we don't forget our special almost two-year-old Vienna. She has been such a good big sister and is still as cute as ever!

Lamborghini Countach

As a young boy, my dream cars were a Porsche 911 and a Lamborghini Countach. So you can imagine my excitement at seeing this Countach at the airport parking lot.

Maybe this will be Vienna's dream car... by the time she's old enough to drive it might be affordable!