I’ve noticed that it’s been a month since I added a blog entry, and so I’ve been thinking about what would be the best “first” story to post on my way back to blogging consistency. I’m pretty sure I can’t come up with a better one than the story that appeared in the Stanly News and press last week.

Now, what makes it funny is that I never even knew it was getting written. I had spoken at the Greater Oakboro Business Association luncheon about 704, and a reporter from the SNAP had asked afterwards if it would be okay for her to mention the 704 project in her article. Of course I said yes, but I assumed she would have something like “and Paul Jenkins shared about 704″ buried in an article about the actual meeting. Imagine my surprise when I turned the page of the paper and saw the following article splashed across the width of page 10A.

So, 704 is now “officially” out of the closet. Hang on, cause it will only get crazier from here.

You can see the entire story here.

This is simply amazing. Make sure you watch it all the way through. WE should probably make this mandatory viewing for every student that comes through the doors of 704. Can you imagine the impact of 12,000 students in Stanly County if they bought into the message here? Wow. Unstoppable.

Perhaps there are not three people anywhere around more excited about the opening of 704 than my children. Ever since the boys started skateboarding, they have been talking about how awesome it’ll be to have the ramps at 704′s ramp park open to skate on. When they found out that we need to raise half a million to get it started, they immediately went into entrepreneur mode and tried to think of stuff they could do to help raise money.

Enter their new business. That’s right, at the ripe old ages of 10,10, and 6, Parker, Will, and Sydney have launched “We Help!!!” They cook, clean, wash cars, design posters, even walk your dog. They’ve got it all – homemade business cards, a price sheet, a spiral notebook with “We Help!!! Records” printed on it. The best part? When I got back from my run yesterday, they told me that they’d gotten their first call – an order for 2 dozen chocolate chip cookies for the 7th grade at Park Ridge. How freakin cool is that??

704 can’t be far off when a lot of people get as motivated as that. Thanks, guys! I’m proud of you.

Google Docs is a phenomenal tool. We use it quite a bit over at 704 to keep up with presentations and stuff. I decided to try it out for logging my push up totals. Here’s the chart that I came up with.

I finished up the Couch to 5K program last week, so it was time to find a new challenge. I looked at quite a few that sounded good, but right now I just need to build up my base miles. So far, I’ve run a bit over 61 miles in just over 2 months. I need to get up around 15-20 miles a week, and right now I’m somewhere around 9-10. So (drumroll, please)…

…today I started the One Hour Runner (scroll down a bit to see the program). In 10 weeks, I will log a one hour run, which should be somewhere between a 5 or 6 mile run. I ran for 33 minutes tonight, which was cool, but the coolest part was what I saw during my run. To find out what it was, you’ll have to jump over to the 704 blog.