On top of that particular idea, or even as a replacement, I believe we should throw in a requirement that takes precedence over age alone. This requirement to vote involves citizens earning the right to vote. Many people may have an issue with that because they believe all American citizens are entitled to certain privileges… voting in my mind is a privilege to be earned. You have to earn your driver’s license… You have to earn your way into college with good grades… You have to earn your way for most anything that means anything in our world. However, the right to vote is given as a simple return for becoming age 18.

Voting to me is one of the most important tools of a democracy and therefore it should not just be handed out to those who do not earn their right to vote. You may say that isn’t exactly a democracy… Well, according to various definitions of democracy, it is. Our citizens are still free, have a right to the power to become an elected official to govern at any level, and they have certain unalienable rights and freedoms from being an American citizen. Earning the right to vote does not deprive any citizen, but it creates a specific delineation amongst the citizens. The delineation revolves around a citizen filing taxes.

You read that right. You get the right to vote if you file taxes. I don’t care how old you are, if you file taxes, you get the right to vote. Why? Too long have our political races been determined by the non-working leeches of our society who only vote those people who promise to provide them government welfare, wealth sharing, and other tax subsidies. Citizens who have paid into the tax booty should have the ultimate say in how their money is distributed. Non-filers are nothing more than people with their hands out asking those who work for a living to provide for their way.

This is of course the straight and narrow point of view. There would be several distinctions which would allow those who cannot work be given exemptions. Disabled people, married homemakers, etc would all be given their right to vote. My problem is with those who have the ability to work and do not. My problem is with those who should pay taxes, but do not. My problem is with those people who drain the wealth from our society and provide nothing in return. Everyone can do something valuable, not doing so and asking for something in return is as greedy as the Wall Street financial wizards who raped our economy of trillions in wealth over the last few years.

Simple and easy, earn your right to vote by working for a living. Working for a living provides a much different perspective on life and responsibility than living a life of entitlement. People who have a third, or more, of their check whacked off with a rusty IRS tax blade have a much better idea of how this country should be run than those who have their life funded by the government. Paying taxes earns the right to vote.

The natural side effect of this policy is that voter fraud would be drastically reduced. Before you would be allowed to vote, you would have to file taxes, which would mean you have a valid Social Security Number and that you are also an American citizen by place of residency, etc. There would be a centralized database of all tax payers with the right to vote and as they enter their vote, they are tracked and marked. Protect the computerized environment from tampering and you have the ultimate no-recount necessary voting application.

We need to understand that our lives and freedoms are not simply bestowed upon us because we can perform such necessary tasks as breathing oxygen or blinking our eyes. We need to have a system where those who provide for the country are rewarded and not reprimanded. I believe we should be required to earn the rights we have, not simply given them because we turn a certain age. Think how much of an impact this simple ideology would change our world… Rather than a society of lazy people with a self serving sense of entitlement, we would have a group of people working for the betterment of our nation… as our forefathers did.

Recently some stores have increased the costs of cigarettes due to a governmental increase of the cigarette tax. It actually starts on April 1^st but some are already passing along the new taxes to smoking consumers. How much of an increase? Try a 155% increase on for size… It effectively makes a pack of cigarettes cost $1 more and a carton $10 more. The taxes are a way to increase the revenue of the various government entities in an effort to offset the losses in tax revenue received through the gas taxes. No, gas taxes did not lower, the amount of miles being driven has, thus less gas being bought and taxed.

Back to my threat… My primary reason for even saying such a thing revolves around the various “days off” associated with smoking and the ensuing breaks to feed this harmful addiction. Let’s just say a smoker takes an extended break each morning and afternoon… we’ll just throw 15 total extra minutes a day into the equation. 15 extra minutes devoted to smoke breaks that your normal non-smoker doesn’t utilize. Bathroom breaks and all that other stuff are effectively cancelled out in this simple equation. The bottom line is the smoker takes an extra 15 minutes a day off in this example. 15 minutes per day comes out to 75 minutes per week, 5 hours per month, and 60 hours per year… all devoted to smoking… while at work.

Let’s say we all get 2 weeks of vacation (80 hours) each year. We have just almost doubled it by simply smoking each day. And, we get paid to do it. Sounds great doesn’t it? Well, it does with all things being equal. But, smoking isn’t exactly an equal thing… we all know how harmful they are and over time, can dramatically affect the standard of life. Smokers are known to become more susceptible to various respiratory illnesses among other sicknesses caused by a damaged immune system. We can actually throw in a multitude of sick days taken by your average smoker per year that immediately decreases the hours worked even more. If we just throw in say 3 extra sick days per year as a direct result of smoking ailments, we are now up to an extra 2 weeks per year off.

You may not think that sounds like much, but multiply those numbers out over a 30 year career. That comes out to 2400 hours less work as compared to a non-smoker… 300 less work days… well over a year of actual work. That’s the smoker’s vacation.

But, at what cost does the smoker actually pay for this vacation? Various studies have tried to put a number to the amount of time you sacrifice of your life per cigarette you smoke. Searching the internet for a few minutes gave me an average of about 10 minutes of lost life per smoke. So, a smoker who smokes on average of 5 cigarettes each day is costing 50 minutes of their life. Just using the 5 day smoking workweek, this comes out to a little over 4 hours of lost life per week. Multiplied over that same 30 year period, we have now lost about 200 hours of our life each year because of smoking, or 6,000 total hours for a grand total of over 250 full 24 hour days of our life.

These are small estimates in my opinion. I believe I am underestimating the amounts of cigarettes smoked and the amount of time associated with doing so. But, given this simplistic example, a smoker has traded almost a year of the end of their life for almost a year and a half of extra vacation time over their 30 year work career.

I’m not quite sure the tradeoff is worth it given that the last remaining years of a smoker usually aren’t the most fabulous and of a healthy lifestyle. The tradeoff is probably closer to a 5 or 10 to 1 ratio. Smoke and yes, you get extra vacation time, but the last 5 to 10 years of your life is going to be very poor. Is the vacation time worth sacrificing your last years of life? Quality of life is important and it will be dramatically lower for a smoker in the waning stages of existence. I’ve seen this first hand. So while I threaten to become a smoker to generate more vacation time for myself, I am rational enough to know that is not the right, or sane, choice. Purposefully sacrificing my health for such nonsense is irrational… not to mention more expensive these days. Receive the vacation time, but you are costing yourself more money and pain in the end hands down.

At some point in time, there are those who actually aspire to become politicians. Yes, even young people desire to become politicians because they are the people in power. Politicians can create immediate impact and change in the lives of our citizens very quickly. However, the young people looking to hold these offices are often looking at it with an innocent point of view that allows them to see the inherent power as something they can use for the good of everyone. They know they can protect and help those in need and help foster a better land.

Somewhere along the line, between the young innocent eyes and the jaded adult eyes, things change. No longer are the political offices used to protect and serve the people, they are there to promote self indulgence, greed, power, money, and ego among many other selfish wants. On the way to achieving these political offices, our young politicians will have their innocence downright ripped from their heart and soul as they play the politics game.

There is no “honest” way to win a race these days. The vast amounts of money and lobbyists behind the major political parties cannot allow a level playing field. Even at the local level, the people with the greatest chance to attain office are those who have lived with the local in crowd of those in local power. The people with strong ties to the banks in town, the business leaders who run the chamber of commerce, the business owners who play the silent partners in the major dealings of the town… Even at the very basic local level, there is still a great amount of power mongering and ego driving.

Political aspirations usually start out as innocent as wanting to become a fireman, but in our current lifetime, nobody can make it through the process without become jaded, changed, and run by those who put them into power. In my mind, our politicians are all run by someone. There is always a man behind the curtain. That man may be a political party, groups with money beyond belief, and even people using blackmail. There is always someone to answer to once political office is achieved.

This is why we do not see any average citizen take any important office. All we are treated to are lifelong lawyers, political leeches, and political office families that pass the torch down from generation to generation as if it’s a rite of passage. The problem with this process is that these people have long forgotten what common sense is. They continually over think everything. They pour over statistics and polls of their supporting demographics in an effort to maintain votes for the next election. They fail to realize what is best for the country may not be the best for their own individual political aspirations.

Making the right decision is hard enough without trying to make everything politically correct or ok by your party’s so called standards. The simple test should be is it fair, and does it promote the growth of the United States while staying true to the Constitution. Our politicians have created such horrendous examples of laws that nobody can figure them out… just check out our tax laws.

We need that nature of the young to return to our lives. We need innocence to return. We need lifelong politicians out of our lives and we need real Americans in our offices to lead us. Who better to lead than the average citizen? The elite classes who run our country have been out of touch with America for too long. They need the boot and normalcy deserves a return to our lives.

But, I also believe that many, if not the majority of people in our world, simply do not want to change. They fear it… they like the way they are… they want everyone else to change to meet their needs and not the other way around. Change is a two way street in my opinion. More often than not, everyone needs to change and meet somewhere in the middle rather than having a certain group of people change to meet the group on the other side of the valley.

I see people in various states of change… unwanted change forced upon them, disguised change for some to see while others see the unchanged individual, and those willingly engaging in change for the betterment of their own life as well as others. Who do you think has the easiest time going about their daily life from the above categories?

Of course those willing to change are going to have a much happier existence simply because they have chosen to change. Those who are forced to change, do so without buying into the outcome that change is good for them… otherwise they would have elected to change willingly. And those who are choosing to pull the deceptive veils of change over their persona are only hurting themselves worse over time. To put it simply, they are nothing more than liars… to themselves, and to those around them.

To me, these people are also untrustworthy. At least the people unwilling to change have the guts to publicly stand their ground and fight for what they believe to be in their own personal best interests. Those who disguise their true intentions are weasels, snakes, and deserve to be treated as such. They deserve no respect for their actions. Change… or don’t… no need to fake it.

How do you live your life when facing change? Are you one of those who accept change and move forward? Are you one who will always buck change while going down in flames protecting what you know? Or, are you one of those who will fake change to get by and keep your precious status quo in check?

Do you know any of these fake changers in your life? How do they make you feel? I have known a few of these people throughout my life and they irritate and aggravate me… for the simple reason that they are nothing more than fakers! I can’t stand fake people… fake attitudes… fake in general. Be real or get out of my life.

Fake people, acting like they have changed, are also manipulators. It makes sense doesn’t it? If they had bought into the idea of change, they wouldn’t be disguising their actions. If they are disguising their true self, they must be doing it for a reason. That reason is that it serves their selfish reasons for a presumed payoff. They are trying to manipulate the people and situation around them to serve their own needs.

Fakers… manipulators… liars… weasels… the list could go on. People who disguise their true actions with veils of deception cannot be trusted. Choose to accept change or fight it… don’t be one of those who fake it.

How easy is it to simply focus on the perceived failings of your competitors and do nothing to differentiate yourself other than to run down the scorecard of these failures? It’s very easy. How easy is it to focus on the shortcomings of your co-workers and use them to promote your own self up the ladder? Again, it’s very easy. My personal opinion on the people and businesses using this copout way of “attracting” attention is that they are showing you their true colors, their lack of character depth, and their lack of quality product or ability.

If you have nothing to differentiate yourself other than to constantly run other people down in an effort to make you or your product appear better, do you have anything better to offer in reality? Shouldn’t your product speak for itself? Shouldn’t your work ethic and character makeup speak for your ability? Shouldn’t you focus on what makes you better and not what makes the others worse? The reason why you see more and more people and businesses take this line of product differentiation is because they lack the cognitive ability to promote their own product ethically with integrity. Of course, that is assuming their product is at minimum, equal to their competitors.

You don’t have to be a marketing major or industry analyst to differentiate your product in a manner that is both ethical and positive. But, it does take more effort than constantly running your mouth about the weaknesses of your opposition. Your consumers, and or coworkers, are not oblivious to the real world, no matter how inept you believe them to be. People do not need to be fed their information as if they cannot form a rational opinion on their own. If you believe they need reinforcement in the manner of spouting negatives about your competition, then your product doesn’t have the natural distinction to win their attention on its own.

It’s not as simple as a “build it and they will come” philosophy, but it is as simple that if you build a product that is inherently better than the competitor, you can differentiate yourself in a positive and ethical manner. Simplistic minds and questionable character development allows a fertile ground for these negative differentiators to grow and exist.

I’ve personally seen more and more of this in my life from individuals and businesses. It turns me off from having a relationship with either of them. If they believe that I need a push to choose them over their competitor, they should show me the positives of their product. If all they can focus upon is a negative laundry list of their competitors, it tells me they don’t have a product I want.

People and businesses choose the easy way out in our lives more often than not. They choose not to focus upon creating their own positive image. They are too worried about getting ahead this instant. Their only traction in society is to belittle and publicly damage those who are “in their way.” Do you want to associate with these types of people or businesses? If they are so superficial and lacking in character, how much importance do you think you are to them? Are you nothing more than a contributor to their bottom line as long as you “agree” with their sentiments? Are you nothing more than a friend when you “agree” with their laundry lists?

I choose to deal with people and businesses of real character. For those who lack this capability, I refuse to augment their financial sheets and I refuse to incorporate them into my life. Focus on differentiating yourself in a positive manner. Yes, it takes more effort, but in the end, it makes you stand out above your competitors more than any list of failings they may have. Build some character, be positive, because guess what, you’re only the flavor of the month if all you have to win people over is what’s wrong with everyone else. What’s right with you? My guess is not a whole lot. Have some class and integrity… it goes a long way.

To me, asking people for help involves getting people truly involved with the task you are asking them to help you on. It means giving them important tasks associated with the current issue and it also means that you must still play the integral role. You are the one asking for help right? That inherently means that the helpers are there to facilitate accomplishing goals and not running the task or project.

I must admit, I’m not very good at asking for help. But when I do, I expect people that accept the challenge, to undertake important roles within the project. Given that I don’t like to ask for help, I like to do most things myself, according to my rules… and the project is completed only when I believe that all goals are satisfied over their original expectations. However, as I stated, there are times when asking for help is the only true way to complete a project or task. That’s when I have to recognize that not everyone is going to treat their work the same way I do. Their version of effort may not be equal to mine. Their version of complete or satisfaction may not equal what I believe to be a finished project.

This simple ideology can lead to a very bad thing… micro managing. In my college years, I was involved in several group projects that accounted for a major portion of our grades. I would ask for help as the project depended upon teamwork and group effort, but in the end, I would end up having to oversee every aspect of the project to achieve a satisfactory completion. This happened on more than one occasion… but my grades always came back high so the results justified the means right? But, did the success of securing a high grade do me any good in the arena of utilizing my team and asking for help? Looking back, I can say no it didn’t.

I see many people in the world living this way in both their personal and work lives. They ask for help, but they don’t truly mean it. They either want to oversee every single thing and make sure it complies with their version of excellence or they want to simply disappear from the project all together. In my case, I was always wary of the capabilities of others. I always thought I could do it better so I needed to be involved. In the end, I limited myself and the people within the group. I basically stunted all of our growth in an effort to get a better grade.

How do you ask people for help? Are you actually looking for people to provide you their expertise and effort or are you looking for a secretary or paper pusher to take over the rudimentary tasks? Are you looking for someone to unload a project on which you have deemed unworthy of your precious time? I will admit that I’ve done both… that doesn’t make it right by any means.

Next time you ask for help, make sure you allow those you have asked to help, actually HELP! Also, next time that you are asked to help, be aggressive and try and assume some responsibility within the project or task. Learning more and contributing is well worth the effort. If you have to spend the time anyway, you might as well get something out of it right?

I’ve had to spend a lot of time going against my natural instincts of doing it all and I’m still not very good at doing that. But I do try and hopefully, I will continue to get better at both asking for help, and providing it.

We can develop relationships by consciously looking out for the wants and needs of others we are involved with in our lives. If we focus some of our time and effort in satisfying these wants and needs, we can effectively earn our way into their good graces. Making deposits throughout the course of a relationship can build a nice balance over time just like earning interest on your money. Everything sounds pretty nice and good to this point. Everyone is happy in this situation right? Everyone in the relationship is getting something for their efforts.

Well, I have a completely different view about things… especially when the relationship involves your family, close friends, and your spouse. Initially, I saw this “Love Bank” as a quick fix scheme…. or a relationship “get rich scam.” While I’m sure there are people in relationships where this type of mentality can succeed, at least for the short term, it’s not the answer to building lasting and bonding relationships. Consciously deciding to fulfill the needs of others so that your “account” will grow in their eyes is a blatant form of manipulation.

It’s a simple do this for that mentality. My wife likes French fries so I think I’ll bring her a surprise this weekend… what she doesn’t know is that I am actually building my account up because I’m going to be making a withdrawal from that account by doing something she’s not too keen on me doing. The simple ideology of an account implies that withdrawals are going to be made. Why is that necessary? Are our relationships so superficial and weak that we need to put layers of fake attention on top so we can avoid the most dreaded word in relationships today? That word would be compromise.

Near the end of the discussion, I simply stated that 99.9% of the time, satisfying the needs of my wife occurs unconsciously. Sure, there are times when I plan on certain things to make my wife happy, that’s called being romantic. But, the rest of the time, satisfying her needs just happens. It happens because I live my life by putting her needs first, before mine, every time. It’s how I live… it’s who I am. She is the exact same with me, it just happens. Our relationship is built from putting others first. I want what makes her happy and she wants what makes me happy.

We talked about this on the way home (we are lucky and can talk about everything) and while our life does go through the natural ups and downs all human beings experience, our relationship has always been happy and very strong. Rare is the case where she is not first and foremost on my mind and vice versa. We simply have a relationship built to last because we live for each other. We do not live each day making an effort to deposit money into our Love Banks. Our banks are always full and they never see, or need, a withdrawal.

If conscious efforts are needed to satisfy the needs of the relationships in your life, I can guarantee you that you aren’t living your life by putting others first. Rather than look for a quick fix scheme to cover up the underlying relationship issue, maybe taking a long hard look at the relationship itself is needed. I know everyone doesn’t have a bond like I have with my wife, but I know everyone can have it. All it takes is a decision to live your life unselfishly. I can promise you, you’re life will be happier as a result.

My wife and I were having a conversation today and I had sort of an epiphany about myself. In my late teens and early 20’s, I realized that all I cared about was my own self. I wanted to be the smartest. I wanted to be the best. I wanted everyone to know and to see that. I actively searched for situations where I could grow my pride and my associated ego. I succeeded at my search and I felt pretty good about myself. My self-serving needs were being met and my pride and ego were about as massive as I can ever remember. I was insanely proud of myself.

However, sometime in my mid to late 20’s, I realized that my selfish needs were simple and short lived. I realized that life is better served by caring for other people and putting their needs ahead of mine. At this point in my life, I began to actively search for someone I could spend the rest of my life with. I was ready for commitment. I was ready to grow up. After serving myself for so many years, I now understood that to truly fill your being with an unending supply of personal nutrients for growth, you needed to focus upon those you care about in your life rather than your own existence.

I was lucky enough to find my wonderful wife around this time in my life… my selfish mentality had changed and I was ready for her to enter my life. The 9+ years since have been continually getting better.

As I look back, I know that if I had continued down the path of pursuing my individual needs of pride and ego, I would have missed my opportunity to meet my wife. I would have solely focused upon myself and missed the path in my journey that led to true happiness. We are all given a chance in our lives to make the choice between pride and ego or caring for others. Where are you at in your life? In all honesty, are you pursuing your own selfish desires or are you pursuing what will truly make a lasting difference in your life? Relationships and family are the lasting differences in our lives.

Being that we live in America, we are all taught that we can do and be anything. We are at the center of our known universe. Serving and satisfying our own needs has been taught to us as our primary goal from the beginning of human consciousness in our generation. We can make anything happen if we truly want it. I’ve even seen books tell me that if I truly believe in something that is going to happen, the good vibes in the universe will provide me my wish. You may have heard of a bestselling book touting this idea, “The Secret.” I hate to tell you, but that’s simply not true.

These days, I still have the urge for the prideful event and I always feel the twinge of my ego wanting to grow, but I do my best to keep these chains of desire out of my life. I have found that my life is much happier serving the needs of my family than serving the needs of myself. I’m sure many of you know exactly what I’m talking about and I’m sure there are those of you out there that are still in the self serving mode. In the end, we all have to live through our own trials and errors and if you can be honest with yourself, you will realize that pride and ego are actually some of the chains that will continually hold you down and feed depression and unhappiness.

Serving pride and ego are some of the worst things we succumb to doing as human beings. Break the chains and realize that serving the needs of others is where true happiness is found.

Our government has taken ownership stakes in many of our private financial institutions in an effort to shore up the consumer’s confidences in their existence. Our government has purchased failing home mortgages in an effort to shore up our decaying housing markets. Our government has rewritten what several of the free markets can and cannot do in an effort to stabilize the citizen’s faith in our economy. These are simple business deals in which the government has entered into in an effort to stop the declining economic situation. What about our Constitutional rights? Our modern government has changed from a government for the people and protector of our rights, to a government bent on disseminating rights to the people as it sees fit. Is that what our forefathers had in mind? Have you ever read our Constitution and Bill of Rights?

As our economy teeters on the brink of entering into a modern depression, our government has become antsy about what to do. They have used the current situation to extend their reach into the private markets and their next step is into our private lives. If we allow our Constitution to be shredded in the name of economic prosperity, what kind of patriots are we? When did a dollar in our pocket mean more to us than our freedom?

I know many people who would gladly trade a percentage of their freedoms for the government blessing of financial security. A dollar today and food on the table is worth more than living in a free society our forefathers gave their lives to secure. Personally, I would rather be poor and free than “rich” and live as a slave to the government. Our country is approaching a crossroads where our nation’s true patriots need to show up and be accounted for.

We have all heard of the massive amounts of bailout money needed to prop up our current corporations in trouble. We have heard about the trillion dollar deficits coming in the next few years our President Elect has stated is necessary to push our country out of this deepening recession. Where is the money going to come from? Doesn’t it need to be paid back at some point in time? Who exactly is going to be footing this bill?

Let me give you one guess, and I’m sure you’re a pretty smart person. The American citizen is going to foot the bill. The payments can come in a variety of forms. Primarily, taxes are the form of repayment. On the other hand, if taxes aren’t enough to pay for the “fixes,” then the treasury must print money or write off the debt. When was the last time an American taxpayer had his taxes written off? Exactly… never. Printing money is a hidden tax upon our society. It will drive the value of our currency down and then we all pay the price of a weakened dollar.

Has our country reached a place in our history where we will gladly trade our rights as citizens to our government in a plea for financial help? Will we overcome the desires to have financial wealth over the desires of true freedom? The cracks in our Constitutional rights and freedoms are already there and are growing. It is up to us to stop them from widening and destroying the basic foundation of our country. We need our patriots now more than ever. If we fail, our country could be destroyed by our own hands and not by some invading enemy. Are you a patriot or a freedom trader (or traitor)?

Sure, if you compare the statistical outcomes, you can term the smaller chanced outcomes as accidents, but are they truly accidents if you have prior knowledge of their potential outcome? To me, an accident is a completely random event that could not have been avoided and you just happened to wander across the path of an unavoidable accident.

Situations arise everyday in our lives in which we face decisions and the associated potential outcomes. You are late for work so you decide to speed. Not a big deal, that is unless there is a cop in the vicinity… But, what happens if one day that you are speeding along, and you happen to run off the road a bit and overcorrect and get into an accident? Was it really an accident? It’s a fairly simple example, but I’m sure you get the idea and logic behind it.

All too often, we put ourselves into situations which we could have missed experiencing the “accidents” in our lives. We must pay attention to all outcomes when faced with decisions, whether they are large or small. Sometimes, the flukes are actually quite likely to happen, we just choose to dismiss any potential bad things that may happen and focus on the things that we want to happen.

Most of the time, we make the right decisions. As we get older, we acquire more experience and wisdom and we can apply forethought to how we proceed in our lives. However, I see other people in the world around me make decisions and choose paths which I would never do. Their paths are littered with potential hazards and disastrous outcomes. They are either oblivious to these outcomes or discount the possibilities outright. But, when the bad things happen, and they often do, they appear to be completely flabbergasted when the accidental events occur in their lives.

I’m not saying that we must over analyze everything we do and if there is any chance whatsoever for bad things to happen, to not do it. I am saying that just because a bad result is a small percentage, it doesn’t mean it is by default an accident. One in a million, yes, that’s an accident. A five percent chance of a bad outcome, that’s not an accident. That’s a potentially likely event.

Start thinking more about the decisions that you make each day. Start focusing more on your actions. Realize that you are in control of many of the “accidents” in your life. You can nearly stop your own participation in creating the “accidents” in your life. Yes, there will still be bad things that happen to you and me, but that’s because this is the real world. Accidents happen, but in my opinion, the majority we have experienced, we could have avoided by simply making better decisions.

If you sit back and truly think and be honest with yourself, how many true accidents have you experienced? How many of your perceived accidents did you play a major part in creating? If I look back at my life, I think the 80/20 rule can apply nicely. 80% of the accidents in my life, I played a part in. The other 20% were probably unavoidable and there was nothing I could have done to avoid the outcomes. Going forward, I think… no, I believe… that I can drop that percentage even further. How about you? What have your experiences been as far as accidents in your life? Did you play a part in your own or were they truly accidents which were completely unavoidable?