craigmcdade.com

Sammy the Left Sandal passed away Sunday, March 16, 2008 at his home on Craig McDade’s left foot, he was one and a half years old.

The shoe doctor declared the cause of death as “complete thong failure” as his flip flop thong became detached from his sole (soul). It will be listed in the report as “natural causes.”

Sammy led a good life, an avid traveler, he logged hundreds of miles through various terrain. He always made it to and through his destination unscathed. That is not to say there weren’t close calls though, who could forget the time he was leading Craig on a crab hunting trip in pitch black conditions on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean.. Sammy nearly lost his life as a wave crashed against him sweeping him into the depths of the sea. Always a trooper, Sammy surfed the wave like a champ and was found gasping for air 10 feet up the beachline. 

Even though Sammy worked in sometimes perilous conditions in the incredible heat of summer, never once did he complain about his sometimes smelly conditions. Sammy loved his job.

“He will be missed,” said owner Craig McDade. “I don’t know if I’ll ever find another sandal just like him.”

Sammy the Left Sandal is survived by his twin sister Susie the Right Sandal.

It’s Monday morning and I sure am tired.

Where do I start? How about I kick it all off with Friday night. I took off work an hour early so I could really start the weekend off with a bang. Sarah and I had some plans for a date night but those were continually changing because of the less than stellar weather we experiencing (can you believe it rained ALL day?) I would rather have snow… well…. maybe not.

Anyway, we decided to take a drive over to Mount Dora, a quaint little town that is inbetween a few lakes. I had found a nice little restaurant to eat at and then we planned on going to see a play at the local theatre.

We had a pretty good dinner and were surprised to find that apparently there was a recital going on in the restaurant as several kids kept walking in with intruments. One by one they kept getting up and playing guitar (butchering) and singing (decent) Simon & Garfunkel songs. By the time we left dinner we had missed the start of the play so we decided to just go home and watch Bee Movie. I fell asleep after 5 minutes.

Saturday was game day. Justin and I were pretty excited to drive over to Lakeland and watch the Tigers play the Yankees in Spring Training. We got up and out early enough so we could get to the stadium in time to watch Batting Practice. We got there in the middle of the Yankees BP and were close to getting some balls, but the little kids got them all…

We lost the game 11-7, but Granderson had a monster day…2 homeruns and a triple.

 I’m excited for the season. Justin and i have declared it the summer of baseball, we plan on taking in several games down in Tampa and I am going to try and coordinate an Atlanta game this summer.

After the game we headed over to TGIF for a late lunch before we made the trek back to Belleview. Lunch was good and we found out MSU lost their basketball game that day (this was a huge deal to most people at the Tigers game).

After we got home we figured out that we were completely sunburned in the worst spots…shins and forearms….I’m still limping around it hurts so bad. There would be no time for crying though as our day had only just begun, Sarah, Justin, Courtney (Justin’s girlfriend) and I had made plans to drive out to the Rainbow Springs State Park for Open Mic Night at the park. We had no idea what to expect but were gonna go anyway. There was a guy playing a guitar, a guy playing clarinet and another guy playing guitar and singing…the award for the night goes to the guy who played guitar, harmonica AND sang… although his set made Justin and Courtney leave their seats and find something else to do. The MC also sang a few R&B songs which was pretty classic in its own way.

After Open Mic Night we headed for home, but not before stopping at a carnival that was being torn down and the smallest Wal-Mart ever for some Aloe Vera and a banana.

We got home and the girls crashed so Justin and I watched tv. Long day.

Sunday I woke up early and went into Church and served in the Children’s Ministry (Sarah went Saturday). When I got home we decided it was too nice a day to stay inside so we went out in search of a farmers market… well, we quickly learned that those have different meanings in Florida than they do in Michigan… so we gave up our search after only being able to find metal shacks on the side of the road selling watermelons.

We drove Bailey to the dog park for a little social time…here we hatched a great plan to drive to Clearwater for dinner and the sunset! We packed Bailey into the Escape and headed for home.

After lunch we left for Clearwater armed with a map and a new route for the “scenic” drive. I’ll tell you, its a good thing we did this because on the way we found the most amazing place on earth… The most wonderful and incredible grocery store I have ever stepped foot in, THE FRESH MARKET. For somebody who tries to eat healthy, this store is much better than your run of the mill Meijer, Publix or Wal-Mart. The food is fresh and organic and they have all the stuff you can’t really find in other stores. We loaded up with a few items and have made plans to do more in depth shopping at another Fresh Market this coming weekend. I’m so excited, we were in there for over an hour just salivating over all the wonderful items we were finding. I should also add that the atmosphere is so much nicer here as well. The lighting is dim and inviting, a far cry from the halogen nightmare I get everytime I walk in Wal-Mart.

We continued on to Clearwater and arrived at the beach and went to Jimmy’s Fish House (the same restaurant we had our reception at) for dinner. We were out on the deck enjoying a great Clearwater sunset when all of the sudden the fog and clouds rolled in and the sun disappeared. Nevetheless, the food was good and Clearwater is a beautiful beach so it was a great time! Before we knew it the time was 8pm and we had a 2.5 hour drive home so we headed home and got back around 11.

When I got home I found out that they are building a Fresh Market in The Villages so we will have one a few miles from our house. So excited for that to open up.

After 4.5 hours of sleep I am ready for another week of work…and a nap.

My mind has been racing lately… all kinds of business/finance ideas keep popping into my head. One of these days I’m going to have to take a chance on one of them.

 So here is my thought of the week.

I have Sirius Satellite Radio in my car. I love Sirius, I can’t stand listening to regular radio anymore. Satellite is far superior… well anyway, their main competitor is XM Satellite Radio… Several months back, the two companies filed paperwork to merge together and become one large satellite radio provider. This is amazing stuff, because each company has their own perks. Sirius has Howard Stern and the NFL, XM has Oprah and Major League Baseball, with a merger you would get all of these talents under 1 company. Suddenly the 12.95 a month I spend would be that much more worth it.

Now, the government has really been dragging their feet on this. If the merger is not approved within the next month, it will become the longest merger in the history of mergers.. the government is getting heavily lobbied by the FCC and other terrestrial radio companies saying this merger would make a monopoly… this would not make a monopoly, there are plenty of other choices out there that you don’t have to pay for. This would completely benefit the consumer. Letting all the oil companies become one…that is a monopoly, oh yeah, it took the government less time to approve the major oil companies merger than it has the Sirius/XM merger.

So where is the Business/Financial thought on this? The stock market. Sirius is currently around $3.20/share while XM is around $12.40/share. The thought is that when  the merger is approved (and it will be approved), Sirius stock will take a huge jump… so the point is… buy now, buy cheap and make a few bucks.

hopefully i’ll have more time to write on this thing again now that everything is getting back to normal…

Sarah and I just got back from our 1 year anniversary vacation. We went on a tour of Florida. I’ll write all about it later, but first I want to put up this photo from the trip. A Key West sunset.