Articles
Drowning the Chickens: Why I Slept Instead of Pushed Through
Eight events. Fourteen days. A dozen squawking chickens.
When stress showed up shouting “keep working,” I did the opposite: I rested. I spent time with family, got a full night’s sleep (yes, even with a puppy), and woke up to a flood of great ideas—enough to drown the stress.
In this post, I share how choosing rest over hustle helped me perform at my best—and how you can beat stress with rest, too.
When your puppy shows you dead reptiles, snakes and (live) vultures oh my
This week, our backyard turned into a wildlife episode I didn’t sign up for. It started earlier in the week with a dead bird. Odd, but not headline material. Then came a snake — or what was left of it — in the driveway. Our puppy, Darcy, proudly found it and tried to...
Four Years. Four Books. No Podcast. Until Now.
I’ve talked about starting a podcast for years. April 24, 2021: I bought three Kindle books on podcasting. I read half of one. Not because it was bad — that half was actually pretty good. I just didn’t take action. November 27, 2022: Black Friday. Bought another...
🐔 Some days you’re the Road Runner. On this day, I was Wile E. Coyote.
The day stress poured down on me. Literally. 🪜 March 1998. The first warm day in a long time. My wife Beth and I decide to take our two-year-old Kenny out to play in the yard. When we get out there I tell Beth I’m going to unclog our front gutter. All winter long the...
My Midlife Crisis Was a Beach Towel. My Cure Was a Jet Ski.
📖 Story: Jet Skis at 50 (From my book "Fry Your Chickens!") (From my book Fry Your Chickens!) It’s a warm day in July. We’re on our annual South Carolina family vacation. I’m sharing a beach towel with my wife. I’d recently hit a milestone birthday. The big 5-0. Five...
🎤 From B– to Booked Solid: What “Simon Cowell” Said About My Speaking Brand
I asked ChatGPT to channel Simon Cowell and give me a brutally honest review of my speaking career — specifically how I stack up among Ohio’s top humorous keynote speakers. The feedback? Let’s just say it was equal parts inspiring and... slightly painful. Here’s how...
The $32,000 Greek Mythology Mistake
How I turned a game show loss into one of the most valuable lessons (and keynotes) of my life. Senior year of high school, I was on our quiz team. We weren’t just answering questions in a classroom — we were competing on a televised academic tournament out of Toledo,...
🐔 Unplugging Go Go Go Gary
How one chicken nearly ruined camp—and how I fried him instead. This past week, I was at Camp Friedlander with our Scout troop. Tent pitched by a lake. Nestled in the woods. It should’ve been peak relaxation. But on Day One, I heard him. At first, I listened. I found...
Will AI Make Us Dumber? I don’t know…
AI isn’t the problem. The way we use it is. Every few weeks, someone declares that AI is ruining our ability to think. “Students don’t learn to write anymore!”“People just copy/paste ChatGPT answers!”“We're outsourcing our brains to bots!” One article even blamed...