New Thing 9, New Thing Every Day: Review Something I like on Yelp

In this world of e-everything, there is a wide range of things I have not done that millions of people do on a fairly regular basis. Over the next year, I will do many of them; today, I am writing my very first Yelp review. Enjoy!

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One of Columbia's newest restaurants, Barred Owl is a wonderful addition to our options. As someone who frequents Sycamore and Bleu (well, used to) I am happy to see Barred Owl join their ranks as one of Columbia's tastiest restaurants.

The menu is eclectic and changes "constantly"; I expect most folks might only be interested in parts of it at any given time (be ready for rabbit, fried head cheese, or maybe grilled sardines). But there is plenty for those with less exotic tastes -- great steaks, pastas, sandwiches and salads (all creative and made with the finest, often local, ingredients). The bar is awesome, too, and offers a wide range of craft cocktails that are fun to order.

The desserts are constantly shifting and many are a little fancy for my taste, but they are made right there and offer the kind of variety that can satisfy a wide range of sweet toothes.

Definitely recommend. If you eat out a lot, put Barred Owl into your regular rotation.

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New Thing 8, New Thing Every Day: Make a List of 50+ Places I Want to Visit

Leigh and I love to travel, including road trips, so this was a pretty fun list to make. It has ended up being 77 places. It would be great to go to all of them, and I hope we will. I have barely done any international travel, and it is definitely getting to be time to make that a priority.

To create the list, I started by adding the places that were just in my head of places that I thought should be a priority. Then, I did some Web searching and that got me to maybe 50. To really fill out the list, I used Facebook to ask my friends, and got back lots of fabulous suggestions (crowd sourcing really is one of my favorite things about this project). Some suggestions were already on the list (which I had not shared); some were places I have already been; but all the rest made the list because I figure a friend's recommendation is good enough for me.

Here is the final list (at least, until I think of more places that should be added).

Location	Country
Kenya	Kenya
The Great Wall of China	China
Mumbai, India	India
Tokyo, Japan	Japan
Ithaa Undersea restaurant	Maldives
Moscow	Russia
Sydney	Australia
Prague, Czech Republic	Czech Republic
Iceland	Iceland
Tuscany	Italy
Icehotel, Jukkasjarvi	Sweden
Hawaii	United States
Napa Valley, CA	United States
Alaska	United States
Post-Katrina New Orleans, LA	United States
Athens	Greece
Hong Kong	China
Barcelona	Spain
Cairo, Egypt	Egypt
Morocco	Morocco
Cape Town	South Africa
Beijing, China	China
Israel	Israel
Kuwait	Kuwait
Singapore	Singapore
Seoul, South Korea	South Korea
Bangkok, Thailand	Thailand
Dubai, UAE	UAE
Basque Country	Basque Country
Santorini, Greece	Greece
Monaco	Monaco
Warsaw, Poland	Poland
Milan, Spain	Spain
Stone Henge	United Kingdom
Istanbul, Turkey	Turkey
Havana, Cuba	Cuba
Easter Island	Chile
Mexico City, Mexico	Mexico
New Zealand
Stellenbosch wine region	South Africa
Quebec City	Canada
The Black Forest	Germany
New Delhi, India	India
Glass Igloo Village Hotels, Finland	Finland
Ireland	Ireland
Glacier National Park, United States	United States
Buenos Aires, Argentina	Argentina
Belize	Belize
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	Brazil
Honduras	Honduras
Salzburg	Austria
Watkins Glen, NY	United States
Bryce Canyon, UT	United States
Luxembourg
Banff	Canada
Mt. Rushmore	United States
Lerici	Italy
Hell's Canyon	United States
Restaurant near Sanyou Cave above the Chang Jiang river, Hubei	China
Tahiti, French Polynesia	French Polynesia
Jakarta, Indonesia	Indonesia
Plitvice Lakes National Park	Croatia
Hardanger Bridge	Morway
Atlantic Ocean Road	Norway
Waterfall Castle, Poland	Poland
Algarve Coast, Portugal	Portugal
Japanese Gardens in San Francisco, CA	United States
Capilano Suspension Bridge, Vancouver	Canada
Stornoway	Scotland
McMurdo Station	Antarctica
Sand dunes of Recife	Brazil
Collioure	France
Cortina	Italy
Fortaleza	Brazil
Seville	Spain
Loch Locky	Scotland
Mackinaw Island, MI	United States

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New Thing 7, New Thing Every Day: Write a Zombie Apocalypse Survival Plan

Honestly, I am not sure why it has taken me so long to create this, even without my New Thing Every Day project. Everyone should have one because the zombie apocalypse could happen at any time, and it will hit so hard and so fast. Thank goodness, our government has their plan in place.

Here is a news story about the federal plan. They claim it is just for training and is not a real thing, but we know the truth, don't we? http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/16/politics/pentagon-zombie-apocalypse/

Over the years, I have seen and read far more than my share of zombie stories. I am downright encyclopedic when it comes to my knowledge of the ways of zombies. So it would certainly be reasonable to assume that I would create a pretty detailed plan and get the pieces into place. I actually started to do that, but that is not the right way to go, at least for me.

The fact is that I am almost certainly screwed if the zombie apocalypse hits during my lifetime. Trust me, wheelchair users do not fare well in that world -- we get eaten, or robbed and killed, or turned into a perpetual plaything for some kind of post-apocalyptic pervert.

I never give up without a fight, though and I know what my goal will be and what first-steps I will take.

• My primary goal will be to ally with one or more people who can help me survive, and get to a secluded, self-sufficient location where I hope to live out my days (traveling as little as possible will be a key to my survival). At least in the beginning, I will have one major strength to offer potential allies: my deep knowledge of what can happen in a zombie apocalypse, what might be helpful and what definitely will not be (for example, all that matters is the headshot).
• The very first step will be to do my best to locate Leigh and Clark and persuade them to go with me. I think I can get that done.
• The second step will be to get to one of three people -- Larry Schuster (Columbia), Brad Tolson (NW Missouri), or David Scott (Eldon). They have the perfect combination of qualities for partnership in a zombie apocalypse.
• They are geographically close to me.
• I can trust them and they will have an interest in helping me survive.
• They have weapons and ammunition.
• They have immediate access to farmland where we can live indefinitely.
• They know how to survive off the land, how to fix things, etc.
• The will not annoy me.
• Honestly, that is pretty much the whole plan. There are other people I can try, including family, but most of them are several hours away. My goal is to get somewhere on less than one tank of gas and figure things out from there. If that does not work, I will probably try to get to Kentucky, where I have lots of family, most of them rural (and I can get there on 1-2 tanks of gas).

Someone will say I have forgotten my mom, or my siblings, or any number of other people who are super important to me. But the fact is that the odds are incredibly slim of getting to anyone who is more than a tank or two of gas away. Trying to prove that rule of zombie survival wrong will surely get millions of people killed.

When the zombie apocalypse hits, I am saving who I can that are closest and getting the heck out of town as quickly as I can. I'll figure things our from there. I encourage you to do the same.

New Thing 6, New Thing Every Day: Learn My Spirit Animal

One lesson I learned pursuing this New Thing is that there is not an actual, agreed-upon process for determining one's spirit animal. Really, it does not seem to be a real thing, but it is still fun to think about.

What I did find were many different online quizzes for determining one's spirit animal, and I took five of them. This was not nearly as helpful as I would have liked, because five quizzes yielded five different results. In addition, I also learned that my Chinese calendar birth animal is the dog, which was not one of the five quiz results. The five were: llama, lion, elephant, eagle, and sloth.

My favorite is the llama (see description, below), so I have decided that the llama is my spirit animal. Let it ring forth throughout all the land!

Have an awesome rest of your day.

- sean

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In case you are interested, here is the full list of my potential spirit animals, with source and description,

Llama (https://www.doquizzes.com/QCKYZO)

Majestic, under appreciated and like 80's fashion a future style icon. Your time will come.

Lion (http://www.spiritanimal.info/spirit-animal-quiz/)

In the realm of spirit animals, the lion wins the prize for most relentless fighter in the face of life challenges. The lion spirit animal represents courage, strength in overcoming difficulties.

The presence of this power animal could also mean that something “wild” or difficult to control is happening. As such, lions symbolizes emotions that are difficult to manage, such a anger or fear.

Elephant (https://whatismyspiritanimal.com/spirit-animal-quiz/)

You're the Elephant - Royal Eminence of the African Savanna! Your deep spirit rules with dignity and abiding love for your people. Your talent to rally the troops and lead them to victory is the stuff legends are made of.

Eagle (http://quizinsight.com/quizzes/what-is-your-spirit-animal/quiz)

Followers of this universally admired totem -- the eagle -- have a striking presence that exudes powerful sexual energies. A sacred animal to many native tribes, the eagle is a natural explorer and its high energy means that it’s not going to remain in one place for long. It’s one of the defining features of this spirit that nothing gets their juices flowing more than travel to an exotic locale.

That’s why eagles do not adjust well to the confines of office work, and it’s recommended that you find something outdoors – even if it’s working in the hot sun in construction worker, or as a park ranger or pilot.

There is a tendency toward emotional instability, but these jags don’t last long. All it takes is a long walk in nature to restore the balance of this majestic animal spirit.

Sloth

You’re as cool as a cucumber, and you love to go with the flow. Your favorite activities include eating, sleeping, and eating again. Your rap name is Sir Naps-a-Lot.

Chinese Year of the Dog

New Thing 5, New Thing Every Day: Fast for One Day

My entire sustenance for the day.

5:30 am
Since this is an all-day thing, I am starting my post at 6:46 a.m. and will periodically update throughout the day, kind of like progress reports.

At this point, I am already a little hungry, but that will go away.  I will drink water throughout the day, to be as healthy as possible about this whole thing. That should help, but I suspect I am going to get pretty hungry sometime around lunch time. Do milkshakes count as food?

9:20 am
Ugh. It is snowing and the temperature is in the teens, so I am stranded at home (darned legs that don't work very well!). There is just so much tasty food within feet of where I am sitting, this is going to be an even more challenging day than I had planned.

12:32 pm
It is a little after the time I would usually eat lunch and, yes, I am hungry. That said, it is not that big a deal, and I feel like that is partly because I have made the decision to not eat today. I feel like if I were expecting to eat, I would feel much hungrier than I do. It is a good reminder to me that so much of how we feel really is under our own control, at least to some extent.

2:11 pm
Really for the first time today, I am starting to get pretty hungry. Over the last few years, as I have been losing weight slowly but consistently, I have been conditioning myself to think of hunger as a good feeling, the feeling of weight loss. So it really is not so bad.

4:06 pm
For the last hour or so, my brain has been conjuring the taste of things I would really enjoy eating (and that are readily available in the kitchen, a few feet away). It is contributing to an interesting exercise in self control. All I have had today are cans of La Croix sparkling water; definitely looking forward to breakfast tomorrow.

4:51 pm
I keep forgetting that I am fasting and looking forward to dinner.

5:47 am (Friday)
The fast is over and I am getting ready for my day. I actually woke up with a splitting headache (which I never do), so I went straight to the kitchen and ate an apple, and the headache is already mostly gone.

Aside from the headache, fasting for the first time ever was a pretty good experience (no, Facebook friends, I did not have the Bailey's!). I don't want to make it a bigger deal than it was, but it made me think quite a bit, mostly about my relationship with food. Yes, food was on my mind for much of the day, but I saw even more clearly that I do not need it quite as much as I have often felt like I do. Food has often played an unhealthy role in my life, and I feel like some of its hold on me -- often not related to actual physical need -- is a little weaker.

That said, I am going to go have a little more breakfast!

- Sean Spence

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New Thing 4, New Thing Every Day: Buy a Lottery Ticket

Ticket bought from friend Daryl Dudley.

Would you believe that I had never bought a lottery ticket before today? I do not really believe in it, but I have to admit that it was kind of fun. In spite of myself, two dollars spent, I found myself thinking about what I would do with the $80 million payout from the Missouri Powerball drawing.

On the other hand, it also made me think about the majority of lottery winners, who end up going bankrupt. I am not so sure that lotteries are a good thing for our society, or for the individuals who play, as a whole.

I will let you know when I win the $80 million, at which point I feel fairly sure I will become a vocal advocate for the lottery system.

What would you do if you won the lottery?

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Day 3, New Thing Every Day: Write a List of 10+ Life Lessons

This was a fun exercise. The first several lessons poured out of my brain fairly quickly, and I had to give extra thought to get to the final four or five. They are all super important lessons for me, though, and have been essential in making me who I am.

Everyone should do this exercise because it forces us to think about who we are and how we became whomever that is.  There are plenty of people in this life who never engage in this sort of introspection, and I think they are missing out. Understanding the answers to these sorts of questions is the first step to knowing ourselves, and becoming better people.

It was also powerful for me, by the way, to think about where I learned each lesson (at least, to the best of my ability). Going through that process made me dig a little deeper, which made the whole process more valuable to me.

Here's my list.

1.              Don’t sweat the little stuff.  (Richard Spence, my dad)
2.              It’s all little stuff. (Richard Spence, my dad)
3.              “What were you worried about on this day, six months ago? You don’t remember and you won’t remember what worries you today. So don’t worry.” (Bill McKenna, former boss)
4.              Don’t get upset about what has happened, just focus on making things better in the future.” (Ed Payton, former boss)
5.              Don’t buy on credit/get into debt.” (Dave Ramsey, radio guy)
6.              Someone will always be smarter or better looking or whatever, but you can still be the best by working harder than anyone else.” (unknown)
7.              Don’t take any crap, from anyone. (Shirley Spence, my mom)
8.              It is never too late to fall in true love. (Leigh Spence, wife)
9.              There are all kinds of people in the world, and they all have value. (Dean Andersen, friend)
10.          Always tell the truth. (Richard & Shirley Spence, my parents)
11.      Accept the hard things in life; they are what build your character. (Richard Spence, my dad)
12.      Be patient. If it is not time to know something (at work, or home, or whatever), then don't think about it until the time comes. (Joe Maxwell, former boss)

View the Complete List of My Planned 365 Things