The Forrest Motto

Few of you will care about this, but occasionally I do a little digging on my genealogy. I've discovered that the first Forrests who arrived to America came from Dublin and the name was originally derived from Foriest.

"This family bears the following arms: Sable on a fesse three hinds erect and erased argent, an oak tree ppr. crest. Out of a dual coronet an oak tree ppr. Motto: Vivunt dum Virent. {They live as long as they are green}."

I suppose it is pretty obvious that if a tree is green, it is living. I guess I'll just try to keep staying green.

Anyway, what would it be like if our families had arms and motto's today? What if you painted your family crest on the side of your car? What would your motto be?

Would you like to hear what people sound like in Dublin? Listen here.

The Likeability Factor

Tim Sanders has a high likability factor in my opinion. So, a book written by him on the subject of being likable seems like a good idea huh?

Well, I was really liking this book until I took the quiz at the end to see how likable I am. According to the test I am about as unlikable as they come. It's not that I am a jerk, it's just that I don't posses qualities that are...well...likable. It's not that I have "unlikeable" qualities. I just don't have "likable" qualities. Maybe as a reader, you see me differently. Let's hope so.

Somewhat more seriously, I really did like the idea that if you improve on the areas of friendliness, empathy, relevancy, and realness you can get a lot further with people. Some people might see this book as an exercise for manipulating people to get what you want, but after reading it, I don't feel that it was Tim's intent at all. I think this book is just a nice simple book to help improve yourself. After all life is better when you are around friendly people right? Wouldn't it make sense that we all improve our friendliness?

Dave Ramsey & United First Financial

As the rest of the world would say, I've been away on "holiday" for the last several days and I'm just now getting back into my routine. Apparently, I missed some good talk radio while I was out. Here's a link* to Dave Ramsey in a discussion with a lady from United First Financial on the topic of their mortgage software.

Do you care to comment?

* My Total Money Makeover is Dave Ramsey's subscription Web site.