What I want to do before I die

I am starting out with 50 things, to be increased to 100 soon. As I accomplish an item I will mark it off and post the particulars about accomplishing the goal.

1. Chase a tornado
2. Attend a Space Shuttle launch
3. Skydive
4. Base Jump
5. Bungee Jump
6. Learn to Fly
7. Get a speaking role in a movie
8. Save a life
9. Visit all 50 states
10. Bike in Moab Utah
11. Visit a deserted island
12. Climb a 14,000ft mountain
13. Make a Family's life better
14. Join the mile high club
15. Meet Bono of U2
16. Learn how to Sail
17. Participate in an adventure race
18. Write and actively submit a screenplay
19. Live on bus in remote area/desert for 2 weeks
20. Go Spelunking-rappel down into a cave and explore it
21. Become Fluent in a foreign language
22. Milk a cow
23. Go to Mardis Gras
24. Experience Burning Man
25. Run a Marathon
26. Pan for Gold
27. Give someone in need my time for a week
28. Get writing published
29. Take Mixed Martial Arts Training
30. Sing Karoake in Public
31. Go Zorbing-Riding in a giant clear ball downhill
32. Go to Carnival in Rio De Janeiro
33. Visit the Grand Canyon-Hike to the bottom and back up
34. Take a photography class
35. Drive a Ferrari once
36. Spend the night in a Haunted House
37. Help Build a Habitat for Humanity Home
38. Volunteer at a Homeless Shelter
39. Make a documentary film of my experiences
40. View a grizzly in the wild
41. Hitchhike and Pick up a Hitchhiker
42. Fall in Love Again
43. Drive Route 66
44. Go to the Kentucky Derby
45. Zipline in Costa Rica
46. Work at a soup kitchen
47. Stay at Slab City
48. Give up all forms of Nicotine
49. Paraglide
50. Survive off the land for a 5 days-Man vs Wild style, Find food, water & shelter

My Purpose defined

My mission statement:
To live a voluntarily simple life as I pursue my dreams while challenging, encouraging and assisting others to achieve theirs.

What this means is that I continue to live my life as simply as possible utilizing only basic necessities. My list of necessities include Shelter (in the form of my bus), Food and Water, basic heat, diesel and gas for the bus. Absent will be items of a materialistic nature as I want to show, through example, that dreams are what you do, not what you own.
Pursuing my dreams consist of traveling to various places to mark items off my list of things I want to do before I die and other opportunities I discover along the way.
Challenging, Encouraging and assisting others that I meet along my travels. I will be actively seeking out people who want to make some change in their life and help them achieve that goal.
I will document my experiences and post them on my blog and to a soon to be developed website.
Some subject matter that I want to focus on in my travels:
- Determine the best way to help those in unfortunate situations
- Give those with a 'will work for food' sign an opportunity to work for food
- Implement 'Pay it Forward' actions, I help someone, who in turn agrees to help someone else in need.
- Participate in Random acts of Kindness
- Promote the website WishUponAHero.com

These are just some of the areas I want to touch upon. My mission will continue to evolve as I learn more. And it is not limited to the homeless or poverty stricken. I believe true Need has many different faces and spans the economic spectrum.

I will also be providing many more video logs to my blog.

Free to Good Home...

Adorable fuzzy critter I initially thought was a Himalayan cat hiding under a car in the Walmart parking lot. Free to good home. Call 1-555-(Road-Kill) if you can love this face. Might want to bring a bandaid for that back toe.

Things I have Already done before I died

As I compose my list of things I want to do before I die, I first had to remember all the things I have already done.
When I look back on life thus far I have been pretty true to pursuing whatever dream that popped in my head. Usually these were spontaneous, spur of the moment things. Others, like falling in love took a little more time. I will add to the list as I remember more things I have done.

1. Gone to an airport and taken a spontaneous trip
2. Flown first class
3. Gone on a cruise
4. Gone to Paris
-Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower
-Visited the Louvre Museum
-Saw a show at Moulin Rouge
-Walked down Champs Elysees
-Drank coffee & ate crepes on sidewalk cafes
5. Gone to England
-saw changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace
-Saw Big Ben
-Rode Giant Ferris wheel
-Went to Salvador Dali Museum
6. Been to Alaska
-Road a train from Denali to Seward
-Took a boat to Kenai Fjords and saw glaciers calving
7. Been to Mexico
-Tijuana
-Cancun
-Stayed at all inclusive resort
8. Been to Caribbean islands
-Bahamas- Nassua & Freeport
-stayed at Club Med
-visited Atlantis resort
-Gambled at Atlantis and won
-saw spectacular aquarium
-Caymen Islands
-Swam with the stingrays at stingray city
-Send a postcard from hell
-Puerto Rico
-Dominican Republic
-visited multi-million dollar houses being built
9. Been to Napa Valley
10. Driven down the Pacific Coast Highway
11. Watched the ball drop in Times Square (2001/2002)
-Stayed at Waldorf-Astoria
12. Been to New York City (3X)
-Saw Broadway Musical (Rent)
-Rode on NYC subway
-Took a cab in NYC
-Took a carriage ride in Central Park
13. Been to Las Vegas
14. Graduated College
15. Been in Love
16. Flown in a small (3 passenger) plane
17. Rode Horseback riding
-Been thrown from horseback
18. Played in a public fountain-daytime
19. Went to SEAL training
20. Been to Canada
30. Chased Armadillos
31. Walked hand in hand on the beach
32. Been snow skiing out west (5x)
33. Owned a motorcycle
34. Painted my own car
35. Built my own RV
36. Scuba dived off Key West
37. Rescued and adopted cat
38. Been onstage in 2 theater productions
39. Been in a local TV commercial
40. Bench Pressed 265lbs
41. Pursued and Dated girls supposedly 'Out of my League'
42. Been Whitewater Rafting, canoeing and tubing
44. I've been skinny dipping (in a public place)
45. Owned a boat and a jet ski
46. Renovated a house by myself...no contractors.
47. Let a girl wax my chest (NEVER again)
48. Driven 130mph
49. Dove from the high dive
50. Broke a bone, collar bone...Didn't really want to do that but in a weird way I'm glad to have that badge of honor.

Planning Stage

Right now my work consists of sitting at a laptop pounding out ideas and sculpting my list of 100 things I want to do before I die. I am also researching online all the possible ways to make this dream a reality.
I will try to still post on a regular basis but I don't want to give shoddy updates until my plan has been firmed up. This is again, a scary, exciting time for me. I don't have all the answers yet but I am confident I will find them. I know in which direction to look. Hopefully I will have my mission statement up in a few days. Until then...take care my friends.

Movie Day

My movie day started at 4:30 am. That is the earliest I have gotten up in a long, long time. My call time was 6am at the Tennessee Titans stadium parking lot. Since I don't know the area I wanted to give myself a nice time cushion. Fortunately traffic was light and my brother's GPS kept me right on track. I arrived in the parking lot at 6:03 am. There we loaded a transit bus that took us to the War Memorial Arena. We signed in and sat around the holding area waiting to be taken across the street where filming would take place.
Here is a shot of holding area. Actually this is the stage in front of the holding area where they where doing some makeup on extras. At the bottom of the stage they provided pop tarts, coffee and fruit.
At about 8:30 we were herded across the street to where we would see the action. I was put into a group they dubbed 'The Ramones'. I think they like to give jazzy code names to groups that was easy to remember. Other groups were called 'Thundercats' and 'Devo'. The Ramones were to be in the front two rows. Here is a picture from my seat. Taking pictures was a no-no on set. Many people got caught and had to either leave or the crew would watch them delete the pictures from camera/phone. Hence my pictures are limited and not well framed.
Gwyneth Paltrow played the role of Kelly, a Brittany Spears type country singer, that has just come back from Rehab. Let me tell you this...Gwyneth was fit!! She wore a black mini skirt and her legs were muscular and toned. And she is an incredible actress. It was impressive to see her do take after take, always having to cry at the end. I also got to see Tim McGraw every scene, as he escorts her off stage.
Here is a covert pic from the balcony of the theater. It was taken in between takes. Because of the crying scene at the end, Gwyneth had to have makeup re-applied after each take. You see her Front Center Stage. I spent about 3 hrs 20ft from her but I didn't risk a closeup pic.
This picture is during concert shoot where they put the cameras close to the stage. You can kind of make out Gwyneth/Kelly in the video screen behind her.
I got chosen to wear a concert Tshirt but I had to surrender my Driver's License (which I had just gotten the day before). They really wanted to get this Tshirt back.
During lunch, I met a girl I had noticed earlier. In a room full of attractive people this girl had stood out. Also, she seemed to run into me often...her path was always squeezing past me. She had friendly eyes. So when I found myself standing next to her in the lunch line, we naturally struck up a conversation. She told me that she was from Dallas. She told me she found out about this movie through an agent. She told me she was a model. Something clicked in my mind. A few weeks earlier at my brother's bachelor party, a friend of my brother's was telling me about this girl who broke his heart from Texas. So I ask this girl standing next to me...do you model for Ambercrombie & Fitch? Her reply...she use to. I asked if she recently dated a guy from Nashville. The look on her face was priceless...How do you know him? I explained I just met him. She started putting pieces together...she noticed how I looked like my brother, who she had met and she knew Bethany. In fact she immediately had to send Bethany a text. It is amazing that a girl from Texas and a guy from South Carolina meet at the filming of a movie in Tennessee and actually know the same people. There were 500 extras there, I had conversations with about 6 different strangers and this one I knew just from a 2 minute conversation a month earlier. What are the odds?
Here is a pic of Me and Lindsey
After 13 hours of standing, cheering and applauding the same 5minute scenes I was ready to be crawling into my bed. My hands were sore from clapping, my mind was fuzzy from only getting 3 hours of sleep the night before. When I was walking back to my bus I noticed how the bridge was poetically lit up behind my home.

I had an incredible experience. Now I just have to wait for my check in the mail.

I have found My Purpose

A friend brought to my attention a new TV series on MTV. It is exactly what I have been floundering about to pinpoint with my project. The show is called 'The Buried Life'. It is about 4 guys in an old bus traveling around checking things off of their list of 100 things to do before they die. For every item they mark off the list they help a stranger mark something off their list.
I had been stumped. How could I give back to others while pursuing my own goals in life. This answer seems so simple to me now. I always knew it would be a great TV idea. A kind of 'Pay it Forward' mentality.
So, I am now going to focus all my energy into this specific purpose. I may recruit some like minded souls (I don't think it will be all that difficult). Finding sponsorship might be a little easier with a purpose greater than serving myself. Now I must implement a plan to make this happen.
I am so excited. I just wanted to make this post. I will post pics from movie day yesterday later.

I dig the little things

I got a paid job. I will be an extra in the movie 'Love Don't Let Me Down' with Gwyneth Paltrow and Tim McGraw for the day tomorrow. It isn't a big deal in the big picture of things but it is the little moments like this that make life interesting. I did extra work on the movie 'Leatherheads' with George Clooney for 3 days and although you only see me if you pause the DVD and look closely, those 3 seconds of fame were pretty cool. I figure I am due another 14 minutes and 57 seconds. Maybe I can add another 3 seconds to my resume tomorrow.
Today the weather has been sunny and nice, probably 45 degrees. Nala and I went for a walk to a local park. More of a trail to the river with a plaque describing an obscure civil war battle, but it is the most enjoyable outdoor time I have had in a while.
I met a curious fella and his daughter on my walk. He told me he home schooled his daughter and I got the distinct impression that they were homeless. He gave me some good info on the local bus system (he doesn't have his own vehicle) and provided some interesting theories on 'Hollow Earth' and Antarctica. It was really eyebrow raising when he thought the North Pole and Antarctica were in the same place. He was a friendly guy though.

Legal Tennessee Resident

Ok, I went and got my license that shows I am a Tennessee citizen. I had to have 4 different documents proving that I live here. No easy feat for a mobile man like myself. But I am determined. Now I can go get some work.
On my way to the DMV I stopped by Autozone and picked up some spark plugs to try and fix a generator problem. The problem that when the generator did finally run, it surged. That means it sounded like the engine was being revved and released, revved and released. This caused very unstable electricity flow, my lights would glow bright and dim to the tune of the surge. Fortunately replacing rusting spark plugs seems to have fixed the problem. Now that sucker purrs.
I may have an alternator issue. My starting battery died, when I wanted to drive somewhere I would have to jump myself off (that phrase just doesn't sound right). I would connect my jumper cables to my house batteries and then to my starting battery. I had hoped that driving around town would charge the starting battery but no such luck. In fact, when I had my first riding passenger, Keith, the battery totally died driving to his place. It was nighttime and my headlights drained the last little juice out of the battery. We drove the last 2 miles in the dark without headlights. Good news is that a diesel engine doesn't have spark plugs (it runs off compression instead of a spark) so my engine still ran strong once the battery died. I charged the battery at my brother's house and I tightened what appears to be a loose alternator belt. Hopefully that solves the problem, I will know if my battery dies again.
Here is a pic of jumping the starting battery.

I stayed in front of Keith & Bethany's house while the battery recharged. Here are the newlyweds at home.

Updates

Ok, I have been doing routine stuff lately and I haven't felt compelled to post. But even the mediocre stuff needs to be reported.
My birthday came and went. I received great gifts of cash that in turn helped me buy the essentials...Diesel, Gas, Food, New Battery Charger (my old one bit the dust), WiFi membership at Books-A-Million for a year and I went to catch the movie Avatar at the IMAX theater. The movie was my special treat to myself. The theater is located near Opryland hotel and a major mall. Traffic going there was as heavy as going to a college football game, which added to the effect that I was going to an 'event'. I arrived 3 hours early to make sure I got a ticket to the 7pm show. I viewed this as a once in a lifetime event, after this run, I doubt I will conveniently ever be able to see this incredible movie in all it's glory, 3D and on the largest screen around. The sound actually comes through small holes in the screen. The story and the graphics makes this groundbreaking cinema experience definitely worth the trouble and cost to see. I can't remember the last time I have been to a movie theater, I can't usually justify the expense. And it was only the second movie I have ever attended by myself.

To help me get around town, my brother Keith is letting me borrow his GPS. I get more than the occasional chuckle from the computer voice directing me to take the next right in .6 miles with a thick British Butler like accent. It seems all too proper for the bus. The GPS has been a godsend for me in the crazy Nashville interstate system. They have major interstate construction going on, actually closing down portions of it through the entire weekend. I'm thankful for the rerouting capabilities of my British navigator.

I am about to become a legal Tennessee resident. I am going to the DMV to get my drivers license after this post. The reasons for this are two-fold: I want to register the bus here where they have less stringent laws about what constitutes an RV AND I feel like it would aid my attempt to find local employment. Employers might not get that warm and fuzzy feeling if they think I am going to bolt in a couple of weeks. I plan on staying at least a month maybe longer. This will be the time I want to save money so I have a cushion to relax and enjoy crossing the country at my leisure during the fun weather months.

This weather right now, cold and cloudy is zapping my energy levels. Motivation is at a low point but I will push on through. I keep my eye on the prize. Freedom and adventure.

I am off to the DMV.

Job Hunting

I haven't posted very much lately because I have been busy looking for work before the newlyweds come back. I've focused in on getting a bartending job. This would be the most enjoyable, non 9to5 type work that would give me folding money after each shift. I am finding that most of these type jobs are already filled around here but I believe my persistence will pay off.

I haven't had much to photograph lately. I haven't had the free time to explore like I would like. I washed my bus when I first got here and now my generator won't start. I washed it specifically to degrease it. I checked the usual suspects...distributor, spark plugs. It turns over but I don't think it is getting gas. It is lightly snowing outside so I will investigate more when I don't have to worry about getting the inside components wet.

Grammy night and Sledding

I really dig Nashville. Something is always going on. One of the first days I was here, my brother's bride-to-be Bethany went to her florist to pick up flowers for the wedding but Jewel was there filming a video. Today, Jason went to eat at Baja Burrito (think Moe's) and Kevin Costner came in at the same time to have lunch. For Grammy night, I watched the Grammy award show at a girl Hillary's with a bunch of people, she wasn't there. Evidently she is the lead singer of a band, Lady Antebellum and won the Grammy for best country performance by duo or group. They were also nominated for best country song but I think Taylor Swift got that one. They did perfom at the awards show. I just googled them and they now have the #1 pop album this week. I never heard of them before I went to Hillary's house to watch the Grammy show. I saw a framed platinum record on the wall. Guess they are pretty good.
After watching the the Grammys (that sounds like a good title to a retirement home sitcom), a few of us decided to go sledding. Missy upped the ante by telling us how they do it in Texas, by towing the sledder behind a vehicle, and she just happened to have brought a ski rope. We all drove over to a local high school with what we figured to be a big enough parking lot. When everybody with cars finished doing donuts in the parking lot (to presumably practice handling their vehicles in snow and ice) we tied the ski rope to the back of Missy's Jeep. The parking lot proved unworthy of our talent so we moved to the road. Each time a new person went it was as if they had to somehow top the person before them. That meant go faster than before. The last person reached 35 mph on very icy roads. Fun and easy for the sledder, scary and dangerous for the driver of the jeep. It was a mailbox and tree lined narrow road. I am glad to report there were no injuries and it was one of the best times I have had in a long time.

After the Grammys before going sledding--
Evan displays his game face
Tiffany - Hawaiian Princess
Photo ops before sledding


Redneck skiing

Philanthropic work

When I come to a town I like to leave my mark. And in Nashville that will have to be the Bordeaux Library branch. Nashville certainly is johnny on the spot in getting my library added to their web site

Check out the two 5 star reviews it has garnered on Yahoo locals http://local.yahoo.com/info-14943637-bordeaux-library-nashville
It makes sense for me to establish a library, I spent many an hour pouring over books and getting online at the Greenville libraries. The people of Nashville will come to this bastion of knowledge to glean the pearls of wisdom I leave behind. And I really don't think it is distasteful to name it after myself, my brother Keith who will still reside here long, shares the name (as well as his wife, Bethany). I don't really mind if he wants to bask in the spotlight that such a grand public building commands.
But I don't stop there. I really like Nashville, especially the older population. So I figured I would endow a little something to make sure they lead a worry free life in their later years. Let me present Bordeaux Long Term Care.

I will have to say that Nashville really is a great place for Bordeaux's.