Good morning, Americans. It's Friday. You want to know something? Because it's like really, really strange.
I got to tell you something. It's really, really strange. Oh, by the way, I'm Michael Kros. This is The Daily Grateful.
I have never gone anywhere in the world. I mean, it just hasn't happened. I've been to Europe. I've been in places all over the country.
I've been to the Caribbean. I've been to Jamaica. I've been to the Bahamas. I have never gone anywhere where I don't run into somebody that I know.
Now, what does that? Does that happen to you or is it just something that happens to me? I don't know. I honestly don't know.
Now, today, I spent today with my good friend Doc, who is the president of our technology club. We had a booth at the senior center place in Dunedin. And they had like a fair there, you know, people had booths. You know, you had all kinds of vendors in there.
They had booths. And we had a booth for our club there that we went into totally unprepared for. But we still had fun. And I got up and I would wander around and talk to people, and I'll be damned.
Today, I ran into a lady that I did not know her, but I knew her late husband from when I was in high school. He was the pastor of a church called Everybody's Tabernacle in Clearwater and a very religious church. I never went to it. I went to concerts because the pastor's name was Otis Green, and he would have rock concerts there, which was cool.
I mean, he really reached, even to this day, Reverend Green is no longer with us, but his wife was there and I met her. And then the woman that was next to her, she looked at me and she goes, you're Michael Kroes. And I said, yes. And she goes, I knew you from the Bonton Club.
The Bonton Club was a teen nightclub that I used to go to when I was 15. Okay. And you know, I'm a lot older than that now. And as I wandered around the rest of the place, I continued to, I ran into another lady who I had known, and she is now in the death business.
She works for a funeral service. And you know, and I found myself today just joining in conversation with all kinds of people, people that I knew, people that I didn't know. But today I just was out there having conversations with everyone. And then tonight I had to go to BJ's.
If you don't know what BJ's is, it's sort of like Costco where it's sort of like Sam's. It's a smaller thing, but I went up there to buy Diet or Coke Zero because it's cheap and I buy my gas there because it's cheap. And I have this special BJ's black card that lets me get the gas really cheap. But anyway, I went there today and I got into a great conversation with a young lady who tried to get me to go with AT&T cell service.
I said, I'm with T-Mobile. I've been with T-Mobile for 25 years. She goes, that's four years longer than I've been alive. I said, there.
And she goes, you know, and she goes, we have great deals. I said, what do you think I'm paying? And we just had wonderful conversations and I just found myself talking to people today and entering into conversation. I've been doing this now for the last couple of weeks, just getting out into the world and talking because you know something?
You have to be grateful for what still works. And what still works is finding stability in a noisy, unsettled world. And you know how you do that? You eventually get to where you're having overload moments.
I know people who just never leave their house. I have friends that never leave their house. And I could easily be guilty of that because I could sit in my house all day long. And I've caught myself doing that.
But I'm instead, I've been getting out there. I'm finding excuses to go somewhere and do something every day and engage with people physically, shaking their hands, looking them in the eye, having conversation, you know, just changing smaller routines and making local connections feel safer. And I'm trying to be positive all the time. And I give a lot of credit to that to my son, Zach, my youngest son, my last born son, as they say, because he's constantly encouraging me to do that because I'm, you know, he's right, man, I got to get out there.
So that's what I've been doing. I've been getting out there and I've been doing stuff. And I would encourage you to do the same thing. Choosing attention intentionally.
In other words, go out and put your face in front of other people's faces. You know, you don't have to consume everything just because it exists, but you do need to go, or in my opinion, as my first wife's grandmother used to say, what you need to do, and my first wife now says that all the time now. He's like followed in her grandmother's footsteps. You know, what you need to do is you need to get out and talk to people.
You have absolutely no idea what a calming effect it has on you. You have absolutely no idea what it does for your, for your tummy. Makes you feel good. Makes you regular.
It's sort of like, you know, taking a vitamin. I don't know. It's just a really good thing to do. And I would highly suggest that you go out and you do that.
Just get out and meet people. And at the end of the day, you're going to be so grateful for doing that because you're going to feel energized and you're going to sleep better. And unfortunately, you're not going to eat better, or at least I'm not going to eat better. I didn't eat better.
You know what I had for dinner tonight? I had pizza. It was good. And little breadsticks.
I had tiny breadsticks. They were good. I like those. But that's basically what I ate today.
And then I went to BJ's and I get this case of 36 Coke Zeros and Zach comes over and brings me one of the cans because he's putting them in the refrigerator. One of them was empty. It was still sealed. It was empty.
Weird, isn't it? Oh, well, we'll see you next week.