Power Properties Offers High-End Amenities

While reading up on home and apartment renovation, I looked a little more at the work of Power Properties (see last blog). Their properties feature a lot of the amenities R and I both eventually want to have in our own home: hardwood floors, granite countertops, stainless steel appliances. We'd like to one day build our own home and we are in the process of collecting ideas. The French doors and European cabinetry offered in Power Properties condominiums are nice touches as well. I also love the indoor-outdoor feel that Power Properties creates with lush landscaping and livable courtyard spaces. R loves the outdoors and gardening, so those types of features are going to be high on his list when we eventually start looking for a new home (or looking at designs!).

Braden Power Offers Affordable Renovations in East Dallas

I've become addicted to HGTV lately. I love old buildings, and I love seeing old houses renovated into modern, attractive living spaces that retain the character and charm of their original architecture. This is exactly what Dallas developer Braden Power is doing in an effort to revitalize run-down neighborhoods. Braden Power and his brother Craig founded Power Properties in 1990 to rehabilitate apartment buildings in the East Dallas area.

Power Properties apartments cater to young professionals. The homes typically feature tropical garden settings and lavish courtyards with pools and coffee bars. Because they are renovating old buildings instead of building new ones, Braden and Craig are able to keep rents affordable and still offer various amenities.

To learn more about Braden Power, visit www.powerproperties.com.

A Faith-Based Look at Finances from Frank Hanna

In his book, What Your Money Means and How to Use it Well, entrepreneur and philanthropist Frank Hanna presents a unique faith-based approach to money management. "Money is a gift from God," he says, "that is frequently abused because of our lack of understanding of its proper use." In addition to examining the questions of what having money means and how much money is enough, Hanna cautions against developing an unhealthy attachment to money. One of the main themes in Frank Hanna's book is the importance of giving money to worthy causes, and how to determine the best ways of giving to those in need.

Frank Hanna is CEO of Hanna Capital in Atlanta, Georgia. He is a frequent speaker on issues of faith and their relevance in the business world.

Tax Debt Relief from American Tax Relief

Did you know the IRS is offering a one-time opportunity to settle delinquent tax liabilities for a fraction of the amount owed? Even though millions of taxpayers may be eligible for this settlement — known as an offer in compromise — few people are approved because of a lack of knowledge about the laws or a failure to properly complete the paperwork.

You can find out how to properly file for an offer in compromise settlement with the help of American Tax Relief. American Tax Relief specializes in settling tax debts, removing penalties and interest, and stopping wage garnishments. If you owe back taxes, American Tax Relief can help you get a handle on your payments and resolve your tax debt once and for all.

Linus Gitahi's Runners of Kenya

I used to have a doctor who drove me crazy. Every year when I went in to see him he would say "Hey, you were in Africa! How was that?" Never mind that I had been home from Africa six or seven years already and he’d already asked me this question multiple times. Then without even waiting for an answer he would say "Where were you? Mali? Is that where they jump really high? Don’t they jump really high over there?"

"You asked her that last time," his assistant said once. Even she remembered we’d been through this routine before.

Nobody jumped really high in Mali, to my knowledge. I can only assume he was referring to the 1994 Kevin Bacon movie, The Air Up There, about a team of basketball players from Africa. I never saw it, but I believe the movie was shot in Kenya, where Maasai warriors are commonly over six feet tall. So maybe the premise of the movie wasn’t that they were such good jumpers, but that they were just tall. This probably also accounts for the fact that Kenya produces a lot of world-champion runners, including Kip Keino, a two-time Olympic gold medalist. According to Linus Gitahi, in his blog The Runners of Kenya, Kenyan men hold six of the top 10 fastest recorded times in the marathon. Linus Gitahi also posits that running up and down the steep mountains of Kenya have conditioned the athletes there to lean forward and use gravity to their advantage. They also use a unique hop-like foot strike that allegedly expends less energy while running. So while I’m not sure about their jumping ability, they certainly do seem to have an edge in running.

Linus Gitahi is the CEO of Nation Media Group, the largest media firm in East and Central Africa.

Wangethi Mwangi’s Kenyan Recipes

People are always interested in what kind of food I ate when I lived in Africa. I guess they expect African food to be exotic and flavorful, but where I lived, people subsisted mainly on rice and millet, so the food was generally pretty bland. The main staple for much of the year was a millet paste that had the consistency of play-doh made from bird seed. It’s definitely not something I would make now that I am back in the US.

If you’re interested in trying new ethnic foods, this blog of recipes from Kenya by Wangethi Mwangi features foods that sound a little more palatable. Wangethi Mwangi’s recipes look like an easy option you can prepare at home yourself. Many of them include fresh ingredients like corn, beans, and potatoes, and he also provides some background into Kenyan culture and describes how the foods are traditionally eaten. Stay away from the millet paste and try some of his Githeri instead.

Wangethi Mwangi is the Editorial Director for Nation Media Group, the largest media company in Kenya.

My Troubled Relationship with Sleep

I have never been what you would call a morning person. My whole life, I have had difficulty getting up in the morning. I will hit the snooze button for an hour until the alarm shuts itself off. I use two alarms and it still doesn’t help. I’ve tried sunrise simulators, clock radios, and alarms that sound like birds chirping. In high school, it wasn’t uncommon for me to sleep until noon on the weekends. I sometimes nap during the day. I’m sure if I brought a pillow to work, I could easily crawl under my desk and fall asleep in the afternoon. I maintain a healthy diet and work out, but none of it seems to affect my need for sleep. I constantly beat myself up over it, since I feel like I am wasting time that I could be using for other things. R says not to worry so much about it; some people just need more sleep than others. But I still feel lazy. What’s more, I feel like crap if I allow myself to sleep as much as I want. I rarely wake up feeling rested. I suppose I could suffer from clinical hypersomnolence, although I’ve never been officially diagnosed.

Since I have a job where it doesn’t really matter what time I get to work, it only exacerbates my problem. I know I don’t really need to get up at a certain time, so I’m not very motivated. Even though I know getting to work late will force me to stay late in the evening, cutting into my personal time, I can’t seem to drag myself out of bed most mornings. I arrive at work at 10:00 or even 10:30, feeling guilty. Sometimes I wish my laissez-faire boss would actually be more authoritative. Sometimes I wonder if it would make a difference if I had a job that was a little more interesting. Sometimes I wonder if I would be better off working from home and adapting my work schedule to my natural rhythms.

Two years ago, I had a bout of insomnia that lasted for about a month. It was inexplicable and devastating. The inability to sleep was completely foreign to me. Being sleep-deprived left me emotionally fragile and mentally scattered. I had to quit my part-time serving job. I saw a sleep specialist, briefly tried medication, and came close to enrolling in a sleep study. Eventually, the insomnia went away, as mysteriously as it had begun. I hope I never have to experience it again. As lazy as I sometimes feel, I’d much rather be a hypersomniac than suffer through that again. But still, since my sleep habits leave me feeling like a slacker, it would be nice to find some balance. Maybe I should check into another sleep study. I certainly wouldn’t want to be dependent on medication to regulate my routine, but if there is something that can help me wake up feeling refreshed, I’d be willing to give it a try.