Speed mile, belt loop, and Krugman

I heartily apologize for the three or four of you out there who actually read this little blog of mine for not posting in a week.  No good explanation, really, just kinda slipped my mind.  That being said, with a week having passed without a post, I have several things I'd like to write about or at least mention :)

First, I finished Paul Krugman's book End This Depression Now!, which is not a necessarily a book about psychology, although considering that it was actually about the economy, psychology obviously plays a not-to-small part.  Highly informative and written in a manner so even a macroeconomic neophyte such as myself could understand.  Sufficient to say, when it comes to the economy, we're doing it wrong.

Oh, and did you know that the European Football Championship started last Friday.  Oh my, how I love large international soccer tournaments :)  Obviously, the soccer itself is fantastic but it also reminds me of the HillcrestBlogger Honeymoon/World Cup trip to Germany in 2006 (with a side trip to Prague).  It took a total of about .3 hours after the start of the tournament to make the executive decision that the entire HillcrestBlogger family will be going to the European Championship in 2016, to be held in France.  Already I'm envisioning a 3-week sojourn, starting in London, then Chunnelling to Paris, then up to Copenhagen, before spending several days traveling around the French countryside before finishing the trip in Northern Italy.  But don't hold me to that itinerary, since it is bound to be tweaked over the next four years ;)

As for my week's worth of fitness, I signed up for the Firecracker Fast 5K, ran a mile "sprint" in 10:09, and gained (or lost?) another belt loop!  I also started Gretchen Reynolds' book The First 20 Minutes, which I heard about on Terri Gross's show on NPR and is really an eye opener.  Apparently, I need to incorporate some high intensity interval training, which I have since started to do, in order to really get this body de-flabbed.  In any event, I will recommend that book to anyone who wants to separate the wheat from the chaff regarding what they need to do to become fit. 

Last, I am also going to sell one of our cars (the 13-year old one) this week.  The HillcrestBlog family is going back to being a one-car affair, which we did to great effect prior to our first child.  It is the responsible choice from a environmental, economic, and life-style standpoint.  I'm very excited about it.  I'll be using a combination of public transportation, biking, and walking to get to and from work, which is only about 2.5 miles from my house.  And, with our kids' daycare within very easy walking distance, this is an arrangement we are approaching as a permanent change.  I'm sure I'll be posting about this in much more detail later so I'll not get into the weeds on it today.