Seth recently wrote a post called The non-optimized life.

If you haven’t seen his blog, you wouldn’t call it optimized by any stretch of the imagination. He rarely posts a picture, and when he does it is only to illustrate his point.

He doesn’t allow comments and he doesn’t use excessive links.

He’s a busy man, and it’s a wonder that he blogs at all, let alone daily.

He uses social networking in ways that maximizes his exposure without wasting his time.

This highly successful marketer/business man/author has taught this Daddy Blogger something very important:

I like to think that I’ve optimized my life by using Twitter to update my Facebook, or using Social Oomph to broadcast that I’ve written a new post every two hours on the day it’s posted.

But I still write all of those posts. Each message, even at 140 characters or less, represent time. Time I could have spent with my wife and kids. Time I could have been using improving myself.

My wife and I have discussed these ideas since I began this blog a year and a half ago. I’ve justified that time countless ways. It increases traffic, I’m making friends, it benefits my writing by helping me write quickly and directly.

As life moves forward, I see these justifications less as explanations and more as excuses. Actually, not just as excuses, but procrastination from doing the real work. The real work of finding myself and my family living lives that we can all be proud of.

Blogging and tweeting will slow, but the quality bar will be raised. If you enjoy what you see here, please subscribe to my RSS feed, because I won’t be telling you every two hours that I’ve blogged. Hopefully, I’ll find a voice worth listening to, and like Seth Godin, optimization (i.e. begging you to read me) will no longer be necessary.

You’ll just want to be here.

I’m about to hit ‘publish’ on this post at 11:00 pm on the Saturday night before the final game of the World Cup. I’d say when it comes to non-optimization, I’m off to a great start!

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Calli: Daddy, can’t you tell me a story? (This is how she asks for everything now. ‘Daddy, can’t you…’ As if she’s tired of asking.)

Me: What kind of story?

Calli: I don’t know…

Me: OK. So. Once upon a time, there was a little girl named Calli.

Calli: Was she a Princess?

Me: Yes, she was a beautiful Princess!

Calli: Did she have a brother named Tristin?

Me: Yes she did! And he was a Prince! He was as handsome as Princess Calli was beautiful.

Calli: Yeah!

And so on. It’s kind of cool, actually, she makes my job easy!

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As I mentioned in a previous post, I’m playing around with trying to create a webcomic based on my family. I posted my first design of Kat as a manga character on DeviantArt last night, but if you missed the tweet, I’m posting it below. I’m taking my time with this, and I want to have three weeks of the comic done before I launch. But I’ll be posting sketches and ideas at DeviantArt and Flickr, and of course, sharing it all through Twitter and Facebook. So feel free to follow, friend, or fan me to see if my excitement will translate to the electronic page!

Speaking of Kat, we’re in serious crunch time for raising money for her Student Ambassadorship to Australia! They need all the money by May 14! We’re having a garage sale this weekend in a last ditch effort. If you would like to contribute, please see the ‘Chip-In’ badge to the right of the blog. Every little bit is appreciated, and we’ll make sure you get a Howe original thank you note from Kat either from the Land Down Under, or as soon as she gets home!

This post brought to you by Dad-Blogs' FatherHood Friday. Be sure to swing by for all the other great Dads and Moms who love to share their lives online!

Of course, today’s kids are spoiled. They can have cartoons 24-7, on demand, no questions asked. Here at Howefitz Blog, I’d like to start  a tradition of making Saturday morning an event again. Cartoons belong on Saturday morning!

This week, after that stirring childhood reminiscence, let me warn you that the following comic book I am going to tell you about is NOT for the kiddos. My readers are generally parents and grandparents, and every time I blog about a comic, I get a ‘That will be great for my kid/grandkid!’ comment. DO NOT find this comic for your kid!

Thanks to Ron Mattocks for pointing me to ‘Life With Tony‘, and his Kick-Ass comic giveaway!

Tony is giving away a copy of Kick-Ass #1, signed by creators Mark Millar and John Romita Jr. Even though I’ve been out of comic book circles for a while, I know that these two are legends and would love to have their autograph!

The comic is super-violent, with an uber-violent movie releasing in April. (Again, not for kids…)

As you can see, the story is of a comic book fan that decides to become his own kind of superhero. The only thing is, he doesn’t have super powers.

So, Tony’s giveaway works like this: answer the question of what super power would you have and why? Post your answer to your blog, MySpace, Facebook, whatever…

It didn’t take a whole lot of thought for me. Now that I’m a family man, I can’t be selfish and just give myself super powers. So, in the spirit of the Incredibles, here’s my super-family line-up:

Ultra-Papa: This would be me. Who doesn’t want the power of flight? So that would come first, but not without some effort. The extraordinary muscles that would be required to sustain flight and navigate the skies would lead to super-strength. Being the adult male of the team would make me think that I am the leader, but actually that would be…

Ultra-Mama: Also having the ability to fly and super-strength, Ultra-Mama is the real brains behind the operation, but let’s Ultra-Papa think he is in control… at least some of the time.

Steam-Hatter: Being able to multi-task in a HUGE way is Steam-Hatter’s forte. She is the informational hub for the team, able to navigate informational super-networks with a thought, and relay the pertinent info to the rest of the team. Still able to kick ass on missions, Steam-Hatter would prefer to stay behind the scenes and keep the team rolling.

Flash-Calli: This is actually what she wants us to call her, no DC Comics copyright-infringement is intended! Flash-Calli has so much kinetic energy in her molecular structure, that she is constantly on the move, even while asleep. She’s agile and quick, and is often utilized as the distraction while Ultra-Papa and Ultra-Mama do their thing.

Baby T: Although unable to speak, Baby T is able to control others with a single look. Objects from around the room suddenly appear in his hands, leading many to believe he possesses telekinetic as well as telepathic powers.

And that’s the Howefitz Ultra Team!

Do you or your family wish they had super powers? Be sure to let Tony know all about it!

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**Just a reminder, my donate button on the right side of the blog is going to Kat and her People to People delegation to Australia. Give what you can when you can to help her on this life-changing journey!**

image found at gracewalk.wordpress.com

A good blog is like a good book. Sometimes you want to go back and revisit posts that meant something to you. One such post by Tim Ferriss has been rattling around in my head A LOT lately. This post was called Real Mind Control: The 21 Day No-Complaint Experiment. In the post, Tim told us of Will Bowen, a Kansas City minister who decided to try an experiment. He would wear a purple bracelet to remind him not to complain for 21 days. If he did complain, he would switch his bracelet to the other wrist and start over at day 1. This is because scientists say that it takes 21 days to form a habit. If you don’t complain for 21 days straight, you’ve just formed a habit of not complaining!

There is now a great website started by Will Bowen called acomplaintfreeworld.org. There, you can order the purple bracelet, Will Bowen’s book and DVD, and even download a widget for your computer that will count the days for you. If you complain, you have to click ‘Start Over’.

Why would you want to do this?

I don’t know why you would want to do this, but I’ll tell you why I am going to do this, and why it took me this long to realize I should.

Reason #1

I’ve related in earlier posts how I may not be as happy with some aspects of my life as I could be. Sure, I have a wonderful family and my health, but I want more for my family and for myself. I find it too easy, however, to complain, or better yet, make excuses for why things don’t go as planned. That is why the title of this post includes ‘No Excuses’. More on that in a bit…

Reason #2

Complaining gets everyone down. Working in the retail industry, I can’t tell you how many times someone has commented on how they couldn’t do my job if they had to deal with the irate customers. I used to think the same way. What I do is think about what I would like to hear if I was upset. How does that fit in to what I can actually do?

So the no complaining piece is this: of course you identify the problems, but instead of seeing them as problems, make them in to opportunities to grow and improve the situation. Instead of just writing a situation off as something to complain about, isn’t there something you can do to improve or even remedy the situation? And if not, why sweat it? It’s out of your hands! Yelling at the Republican or Democrat on the television screen is just raising your blood pressure. The politician still sleeps at night, and won’t change his/her tune for you!

Why did it take me so long to decide to do this?

The answer is remarkably simple: Complaining is easy. There’s a certain release to cursing something that doesn’t go right. It releases you from the hassle of actually doing something about it. If you can blame something else, you’re not the responsible party, right? WRONG! If you don’t learn from those mistakes or incidents, you’ll just have more and more to complain about later on…

My dad always says that when you point a finger at someone (or something) three fingers are pointing back at you. This is why No Excuses is part of my 21 day experiment. If I’m not happy with something in my life, instead of making excuses (“It’s the economy!” “It’s the weather!” “I’m just following orders!”), I’ll find solutions and a way to take advantage of the opportunities.

I would like to invite you all to join me in this experiment. You don’t have to buy the bracelet, just throw a rubber band on your wrist, or download the widget like I did. The point is to stop complaining. And stop making excuses!

I will, of course, be blogging my progress, and in the name of honest blogging, will blog my failures as well.

If you are joining me in this experiment, please, let me know below. I will also start a discussion on my Facebook fan page, so you can chart your progress there as well!

Good luck!

This post brought to you by Dad-Blogs' FatherHood Friday. Be sure to swing by for all the other great Dads and Moms who love to share their lives online!

I’ve spent all morning working on today’s post, well, the bits of the morning where I wasn’t taking The Teenager to school. Then there were the times I was holding the baby, which is a chore, let me tell you. Every time I hold that warm little snuggly body against me I can’t help thinking that I’d much rather be in front of my glaring blank white computer screen instead of throwing the baby in to the air and hearing his sweet, genuine giggle as I tickle under his ribs with my nose. Who wants that?

Anyway, where was I? Oh, yeah! I’ve spent all morning on a post that I can be proud of. This is not that post. I’ve decided to postpone that post until next Fatherhood Friday in order to do more research and obtain further photographic evidence.

So for today, please enjoy this peek in to my random fatherly brain, and I promise, next week will be a post more worthy of your precious time.

• My wife is the best editor/reviewer that I could ask for. She is the one person that I would allow to give me advice on my writing. She nails it every time, and is the reason the real post for today is postponed. I felt like something was missing, and she filled in the blanks. Man, I love her.
• Pandora just played Richard Strauss’s ‘Also Sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spoke Zoroaster), Tone Poem For Orchestra, Op. 30‘, which was the theme for ‘2001: A Space Odyssey‘, and I had to stop what I was doing and turn it up. I lowered myself to the level of my desk and imagined my laptop was a monolith. It did not, however, make me more cosmically aware. It just wanted to tell me not to use teeth whiteners or drink acai berry juice. The search for cosmic enlightenment continues…
• Last night, my considerate Calli gave my wife an astute warning about the window sill: ‘Don’t touch that,’ she said, ‘I put a booger there.’ She’s so thoughtful!
• Tristin’s asleep in his bouncy while still holding tightly to his knobby bouncy ball. He’s so cute!
• My wife hasn’t missed a day on the Wii Fit since we started, while it just yelled at me for missing four. My Mii is now sentenced to wear a hoody to sweat it out. Come on, Wii! I’ve been busy!
• We’re still wrestling with exactly the right punishment for Kat after she dented the wall with the Wii remote, and then didn’t tell us… Any ideas out there?
• I am pleased and honored to announce that I have 42 fans on Facebook after starting my fan page four days ago! Thank you all for the support! If you haven’t fanned me yet, there’s a convenient badge on the right for you to do so! My hope is that the page will add another level of interactivity to this blog, and sometimes I’ll be using it as a testing ground for upcoming posts, so be sure to check the discussion board! (Hint, there are a couple of discussions up now…)

Aaaand… my brain just stopped working. Hope all is well with you, and have a great time reading all the other Fatherly posts on this Fatherhood Friday!

Yesterday I was selling iPhones at work and striking up conversations with the customers. One couple had a one year old with them. He just kept giving me this huge, toothy grin. At least, it would have been toothy if he had more than four teeth! I just couldn’t stop looking at his giggling little self, so I said, “You look awfully happy! Is this going to be your new toy?”

“Noooooooo.” the father quickly replied.

“It won’t be long.” I said. “Leap Frog makes a baby blackberry.” (They do. Check it out!)

We then had a conversation about the dangers of the internet, and more importantly, how you can become anyone you want to be on the internet.

Now, for the most part I think I do pretty well with just being myself online. I’m pretty much the same boring, run-of-the-mill person I’d be of we met face to face.

But for some reason, I feel the need to show off my online life and how I use different apps to achieve excellent daddy blogger status. Any suggestions on how to streamline this process would be greatly appreciated!

Obviously, I write this blog. When I post a new entry, I head over to ping.fm and announce it, which automatically updates my twitter, facebook, and MySpace to let everyone who cares and some who don’t that I just blogged today.

I also write ‘Kids Play On The Net‘. This is a weekly column about kid-friendly websites for education and entertainment over at dad-blogs.com. I can’t pimp that site enough. It’s truly a great place for dads and moms to hang out. When they post my column, it’s back to ping to let everyone know.

MySpace is dead to me. The only thing I do over there is look every once in a while to see if ping updated it. MySpace is targeted at teens, and as far as I’m concerned, they can have it. I still have a couple of friends over there that haven’t come into the light of facebook, so I still have a profile there. Meh.

Facebook is crazy. Not only have I reunited with long-lost friends there, but I’ve also had conversations with writers and artists and people I admire. These are people I’d just stammer at in public. But on facebook it’s just easier. OK, so maybe I am a little different online.

Twitter. What have I not already said about twitter on this blog? Twitter has truly become an addiction. I check it constantly on my phone. I enjoy ‘live tweeting’ my days off and family activities. I enjoy it so much that I created a daily segment on this blog through twitter tools called ‘Twitter Tittelations’ that gives you my daily tweets in digest form. Daily. Is that annoying? Let me know! I thought it was a great way to post daily without typing an entire post, but I may just be fooling myself.

I also have friendfeed, stumbleupon, technorati, and digg accounts, but I still haven’t devoted enough time to those to figure out how to use them.

That’s it in a nutshell: the tools that this daddy blogger uses. Any more I should get into? What do you use?

So here’s the scoop: around November, I changed my unlimited mobile data plan to what I thought was an unlimited tethering plan, so that I could hook my Blackjack II smartphone up to my laptop and use it as my modem. Bear in mind the unlimited misunderstanding was not an oversight on my part, I was told that it was unlimited by an AT&T salesman.

Fast forward to Christmas time. I’m laughing it up with my family and having a good time. We’re listening to Pandora‘s holiday mixes (Having grown tired of my own), streaming  the newest Muppet holiday special on hulu (because I had yet to set up my cable since we moved in November), and generally taking advantage of my unlimited tethering from AT&T.

Little did I know that it was anything but unlimited. I started recieving texts that I was reaching my limit around Christmas time. I ignored the first couple, then curious, I called AT&T to see what this was all about. The person on the phone that day assured me that there was a ‘soft limit’ of 5GB, but that any overages I had would not be charged to me. My next bill was $1,600!!!

WHAT?!

So I called AT&T back. This person tells me absolutely, the limit wil result in fees and I will possibly lose service if I continue my hedonistic streaming of music and video. He said this limit is set by the FCC. I have done a few Google searches on this and have come up with zilch. If you happen to know any more about this limit, please comment below!

Anyway, so I look in to their plans, and yes, it does say there is a 5GB limit, but it still says unlimited for their regular data plan which is half as much. Hmmmm….

So I call again, trying to figure out what they’ll do about this $1,600 bill! The next rep I get ahold of goes through the notes and sees where I was told about the ‘soft limit’ and sends my account on to some other department for review. My bill goes back to the normal level. But, now I’ve lost data service four days after my billing cycle for exceeding my limit, the first internet exile of nearly a month.

The next month, $2,000 bill. I’ve stopped watching hulu, streaming XM and Pandora, and even YouTube. What the heck. I haven’t given AT&T another dime until this is resolved. They suspended my service, phone and all, last week. I got them to turn it on Monday, because I still have a dispute and it has yet to be resolved. They waived the $36 reactivation fee. Whop-dee-freaking-doo! I have a pregnant wife at home, and really don’t want to go without phone service again!

So, here I am, blogging on what feels like ‘borrowed time’. If my online persona once again goes silent, this will be the reason. I’m now two days past when the last person I talked to told me this should be resolved.

Cross your fingers for me, and please, when considering data plans through wireless carriers, read all you can about it first!

Kat, age 1 1/2

As I begin to write this, it’s just after 4 am in the Rocky Mountains. My beautiful wife and two children are still asleep. I’m awake on purpose. I set my alarm for this time. This is my favorite blogging hour. Some days, I miss this hour. I hit the snooze alarm a few too many times, or I do get up and get sidetracked by checking email, my twitter followers, Facebook, and MySpace. But today is special. According to Dad Blogs, today is fatherhood Friday.

This is the first fatherhood Friday I’ve had the pleasure to be a part of. I know it will be the first of many. Since this is my first, I really gave some thought to what I would say today. I have not yet read any other blogger’s previous posts for fatherhood Fridays because I wanted to strike out there and make this my own. I’m sure when I’m done with my post today, I’ll explore and see what others have written to see if I even come close to the mark of what others feel and want to see in these blog entries. 

I thought about trying to take one aspect of fatherhood and exploring that, but I think instead I’ll give you an overall picture of what my life as a father has meant to me.

I crowded my way in to Kat’s life when she was only four. I had met her mother, Bobbette, in an art class and within a week we were finishing each other’s sentences. As a single mother, naturally, Bobbette was cautious about who she let into her home. She didn’t want Kat feeling as though men came and went through their lives. Eventually though, I was allowed to come over. At night. After Kat was asleep. 

Bobbette and I were snuggling on the couch, watching a movie neither one of us truly cared about. Without any advance signal, a little toy car rolled across the floor from the direction of Kat’s room. I remember little Kat stumbling out of her room, big green eyes wide with curiosity. Bobbette picked her up and carried her back in to her room. I remember that little cherub face watching me as it was carried back to bed. I already loved her mother at first sight. Could that truly happen twice? I was terrified.

Bobbette’s almost five years older than me. She had Kat when she was twenty, which means that I was fifteen when Kat was born. The same age she is today. At twenty, what did I know about being a parent? I was too in love with Bobbette to run away, and now I had seen the daughter that people had ‘warned’ me about when I first starting looking at Bobbette with longing. I had no clue what I was doing, but now  I realize that no parent does!

Calli, born perfect!

I was so full of fear. I was afraid that I couldn’t support a family. I was afraid I wasn’t the right father for Kat, thinking that I probably acted more like a brother than a father (Something she’s admitted since), because I still felt like a kid myself. A friend of mine who grew up in a home with a step-father who acted more like a brother once told me, “Those are the best kind. Trust me.” I hope so.

We ‘settled down’ together by actually gaining the certificate that says the law officially recognizes what I already knew: that I would spend the rest of my life with these two young ladies. And eventually, along came Calli. 

Calli was the apple of my eye before she was even born. While she was still inside the womb, when her mother and I would cuddle in bed, we could feel her gently caressing us. We knew she would be a loving soul, and she is. She gives the biggest and best hugs. She can also wrestle harder and longer than any little boy I’ve ever met. Her laugh will bring a smile to any broken heart or solemn face she comes in contact with. She’s the light of my life.

They all are, mother and daughters, the whole of my universe. And I’m not stopping there! As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I have a third child on the way. I’m just as terrified today as I was when I first saw those big green eyes staring at me over her mother’s shoulder. But I’m also fascinated, and amazed, and excited beyond words. The things we will all share with eachother, the places we’ll go…

I would not miss this ride for anything…

Kat and Calli sort through their Halloween haul!

So I’ve made moves to balance this new found lust for a digital life with my real one.

First and foremost, I wake up early. I’m not saying this is for everybody, but it works for me. (Kind of ironic, really. I used to be a ‘nightowl’, and now I do my best work in the early morning!) In my blog entry, ‘Balancing Life, Family, and Technology: How Some Authors Do It‘, Dayton Ward addressed how much sleep he got by saying:  

“I sleep more than you might think, but less than I’d like, or which some folks might consider healthy. Between the dayjob, family, and writing, I average between 4-5 hours of sleep a night during the week. On weekends, I sometimes am able to squeeze in another hour or, on very rare occasions, sneak in a nap. It all depends on the schedules my wife and I are keeping on a given weekend.”

I’m not saying I sacrifice sleep because Dayton does, but I had begun that habit before our email interview, and this just sort of reinfoced the notion that I was probably OK with the five hours I generally get. (Without the aid of energy drinks, mind you!) I tend to blog/plot my webcomic during these early hours when the rest of the family is asleep and it’s quiet and I can think.

The second thing I’ve done is tried to make my hobby my family’s hobby! (But not in a bossy way!  ;P ) Turns out Calli enjoys my drawings, so when I’m working on the webcomic, here’s my method:

I do the pencil and ink BY HAND (Calm down, tech nerds, it’ll be alright…), scan it in to my computer, and color it there. (Nerds release the intake of air in an uneasy sigh of relief.) During this process, I also print out a copy of the inks and let Calli color on it while I work on my own coloring. I have to admit, I cheat once in a while and look over her shoulder for ideas…

The point of all this is that a lot of people drive themselves crazy looking for the ever-elusive ‘me’ time. Take a breath and realize what you have right in front of you. Take advantage of those things, and you’re life will feel much fuller.

            Incidentally, Hulu is my current favorite site to stream television shows, though Joost has a lot of good stuff too.

            To get back to my story, AT&T sent me warning texts that I was ‘nearing my data limit.’ They then cut off the data on my phone and socked me with a phone bill of nearly $1,800! Fortunately, they found notes in my account that I was told that it was unlimited data, so my bill is back down to it’s normal, more reasonable $180. Unfortunately, they won’t turn the data back on until my next billing cycle, the 11^th of next month!

            So, since January 15^th, I’ve been in internet exile.

            I haven’t been completely silent, however. I did send an update through Twitter each day through text messages. If you didn’t know already, you do so by simply sending a message to 40404. This will send the update to Twitter just like you were sitting at your computer. I also had already set up Facebook to automatically update when I tweet, so I was able to essentially speak but not hear. What a very strange feeling!

            Now I’m back! I’m on vacation this week from my real job, so I’ll be using the library to blog until I get internet service set up at my apartment. I’m pretty excited about that, because I’ve never had a true DSL connection before. I’ve used my cell phone as my modem for years, with varying results.

            The good thing about not having internet attached to my hip at work or at home is that it gave me some time to reflect on the direction my blog is going. I try to include information that I think fellow bloggers/fanboys may enjoy, but I lacked any one clear direction.

            While in exile, I read John Chow’s eBook, ‘Make Money Online With John Chow’. I had downloaded it earlier, and never read it because I was always online! One of the things that John stresses is to build a brand. Now, I’m not expecting to make money just yet, but I do want to provide useful content for my readers, and I think that branding is important for that.

            So I spent the exile really thinking about what I want to do with this blog, and I thought really hard about what’s important to me. I thought about the blogs that I spend the most time reading. Lately, I have been reading the successful bloggers who are making money doing this, but since I’m not making money yet, I didn’t think that I would be very successful training others on making money online. I read a few news blogs, but I don’t exactly live in Washington. I’ve written a few movie reviews on my blog, but I don’t think anyone but a couple close friends really care what I think about movies. So I kept thinking about my passions, and all that other stuff faded, and one thing shone brighter than anything else: parenting.

            I love being a parent. I discovered that the blogs that I truly enjoy reading is Dad-O-Matic and Savvy Daddy. Not only do I learn from these blogs, but I’m entertained by them. I can relate to them. I would love to join their ranks.

            So, I am now announcing that howefitz.com/blog will become a ‘daddy blog’. Here, I will share what I learn in life and online, and tailor it to the technology savvy, online Dad. What resources are out there? Can you truly have a good, educational experience with your kids online? I’ll still share blogging tips that I learn and I’ll still share personal stories. I’ll even keep my tagline of ‘Family, Life and Technology and somehow making the pieces fit!’ Although, I expect as I get better at this, I’ll be able to drop the ‘somehow’! 

            And so, gentle readers, welcome to the frantic meanderings of a Digital Dad. I hope you enjoy it.