Paddle Fast! Your Cardboard Boat is Sinking
Paddle! Paddle! I yell at the kids in their cardboard boat. Paddle faster! Yet, their boat is slowly sinking under them, as the water seeps in the bottom, compromises the sides, and the duct tape fails at the seams. This is the annual Eastwood Lake Cardboard Boat Contest, and trophies – and bragging rights! – […]
Read MoreDid You Zorb in Pigeon Forge?
Round and round we roll. Hanalei, Archer, and I. In a giant clear plastic sphere with a lubrication of warm water. Tossed and turned, we yell, laugh, and lurch down a giant hill. We are Zorbing and it’s awesome! To Zorb is to experience the tourist trap that is Pigeon Forge, the Appalachian Orlando that […]
Read MoreMy New Endorphin Religion
Concentrate! This is what I tell myself as a turn, brake, accelerate. Survival over speed matters most in Carolina North Forest. I am back outside pushing my exercise limits on a bicycle I nicknamed, “The Beast.” It is Sunday morning and I am reaffirming my endorphin religion by mountain biking along twisting trails with two […]
Read MoreA New Day with Deloitte
Four years ago, my family and I rolled into North Carolina unhoused, unemployed, and unhappy after my Philippine dream job fiasco. There is nothing quite like losing your job, house, car, and school, and then fleeing a country to put you into a professional funk. Then my wife found at job at Duke, I found […]
Read MoreHave You Flown Yet?
I flew on my first flight before I was born. My mom was so pregnant with me that she could not fasten her seat belt for takeoff from Australia on our flight to Bali, Indonesia. I’ve not stopped flying since. Well, until a global pandemic. I went from flying over 100,000 miles per year, for […]
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