Yesterday, August 19th, was the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Dieppe. It was a disastrous attempt to invade France during WW2. The invasion force was primarily Canadian supported by some British troops.

While it was a defeat, like all failures in life, there were many lessons learned that helped the allies make D-Day a success but at a terrible loss. There were over 900 Canadians killed and almost 1400 taken prisoner.

The Legion branch in the next community to the west of me is named after Lt. Col. John Foote. He voluntarily became a POW at Dieppe in order to continue to minister to the men of that he was serving with. In doing so, he became the only Canadian Chaplain to earn the Victoria Cross for valour.

A commemoration of the battle of Dieppe was held at the branch near the cairn at the front of their branch. The cairn is there in honour of those who fought at Dieppe and the base holds stones brought back from the beaches of Dieppe.

It was a bright sunny day when we arrived but midway through the service the clouds opened and drenched us all. The service carried on without missing a beat. As one vet once reminded me, “battle never stopped to wait for rain to end”.

Onward to today’s rambling

The Entrepreneur and the Business Plan

If you are interested in starting a business, you’ll need a business plan. If you not sure why you need a business plan, you should have a look at @kristinaljfom’s post on business plans.

Move out of your comfort zone

How comfortable are you in your comfort zone? Do you even know you have a comfort zone? There are very few people I know, including myself, who not only have a comfort zone but rarely push themselves out of it. @xmachina writes about the benefits that outweigh the fear of getting out of that zone, at least occasionally.

It's not about TIME; it's about PRIORITIES

Not sure that the title of this post matches the content, but, the content provides a message that deserves being shared. When we’re looking at out lives and what we’ve ‘accomplished’ we tend to look for the big stuff. Our real accomplishments is in the small stuff and most importantly, the small things we do for others that might take but a moment of our time but will mean much to someone else.

I have an elderly friend I met at church. At the time she lived on her own in the home she was raised in. She would often appear at church with a smile, a few kind words and a clipping from the local paper. As I got to know her and watched how she interacted with the world I realized that she spread her wealth around. Not her financial wealth, but her wealth of small but meaningful acts of kindness.

It might be just a smile and kind word, a church bulletin dropped off to a shut in or clippings from the papers but it told the recipient that she had been thinking of them.

She’s in a retirement residence in a nearby town now as she’s in her late 80’s and wasn’t able to live on her own anymore. If I don’t get in to see her, I do give her a call periodically and have a chat with her. I did that recently.

We caught up which meant she learned I had recently been very ill. A few days later I opened my door to find a bag attached to the door handle. Inside the bag was a get well card and several clippings of articles and pictures she’d been saving from the paper when I showed up in it. She had a friend drop it off on his way by. It sure brought a smile to my face.

Multi-Tasker... NOT

@kyusho writes about the dark side of multitasking. We don’t really multitask, we really keep switching our attention from task to task. In small ways, that can be a benefit in getting small jobs done but getting too deeply into the belief that we can multitask actually decreases our abilities, most notably our IQ.

I’ve noticed that I have to make myself focus on one job at a time. My mind wants to keep jumping from task to task. While that is okay for routine tasks, when I’m doing something that is new or more involved, I can lose track very easily. The last while I have been very deliberately working on avoiding distractions when I’m doing certain tasks.

It’s a male thing right, spreading the seed. Humans are a farming species, so what can I say?

How often have you encountered the double entendre? The comment that means one thing on the surface but has another meaning, usually sexual, underlying it. It isn’t often you come across a whole story that is one. @wmbm has done a great job with this. It’s not a long read.

My Blockchain Blog - Post 1: What the hell is blockchain?

You’ve heard of blockchain right? If you haven’t, you may want to know you are reading a post on a blockchain. The STEEM currency we receive for posts is produced on a blockchain. Like our car, we don’t actually have to know how it works to use it, but it’s at least interesting to know. @myblockchainblog has written a post for the non-techy to start to get the basic idea of what the blockchain is and how it differs from the networks we’re used to.

"Improving my Art in drawing"

One of the things I always appreciate artists on Steemit doing is sharing their artistic process with the viewer. It not only shows the work belongs to the artist but it helps the non-artistic like me understand the work that goes into a piece of art. @dwightjaden has provided a very detailed overview of his beautiful sketch of a tiger. Nicely done.

A few comics I drew about ideas in philosophy

Philosophy can seem like a deep impenetrable subject area, yet, there is a certain fascination to exploring it. Comics have a way of simplifying many topics and @danmaruschak has managed to simplify some of the aspects of philosophy.

Going-To-The-Sun Mountain and Saint Mary Lake in Glacier National Park

@skypilot not only takes some fantastic shots of his subjects but he provides some great background on them. Not being a traveller, I very much appreciate someone who can provide great information on an area.

Swiss Private Bank to Add Support for Ether, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash

@knowledgehubb writes about the entry into the European mainstream markets of cryptocurrencies. These are all steps in the average person gaining awareness of the world of cryptocurrency. Not like I was a year ago, vaguely aware they existed but considered them irrelevant in my life. How perception can change quickly.

Why I quit my job today...

@youareyourowngod writes about quitting his steady pay cheque to leap into the world of the self-employed. Some people have to have a pay cheque to give them a sense of security, others can and must take the chance of having to create their own income.

Over a decade ago I had a steady pay cheque. Some issues related to the job and not prompted my doctor that I had at the time to put me off the job on stress leave, twice. The second time I told her that I would be in no hurry to return. I never did return.

In the intervening years, I’ve had a lot of struggle for income and keeping myself on a financial even keel but I don’t miss not being tied to a j-o-b where someone else calls the shots. I either do the work to earn the income or I struggle, my choice. Once I accepted that, the ‘struggle’ just became one of my choices that I could change by my own actions.

The World of Dyslexia: The Difficult Journey to Be Understood

@cabbagepatch has written an excellent post on the language based learning disability, dyslexia. Many people consider someone with dyslexia to be intellectually challenged, the fact is most of them are very intelligent people.

Wrap-up on Day 111

Found some great posts today, always makes the hunt worth while. For those who are curious about my process. Each post is reviewed by me twice. I use a feed reader to explore posts. When a post catches my eye I do a scan down through it and mark it as a favourite.

When I have selected about 20 posts, I then setup this post and use the feed reader’s app on my iPad to fully read the posts I’ve selected. On this second pass through the post I decide if it will be included in the Ramble or not. Some days I keep more than others.

I’ve also decided to let you, dear reader, nominate posts you like. This is not an opportunity to spam me with your own post. It is an opportunity to share a post that you really like of someone else. See below for how to do this.

Supporting and Upvoting

Let’s not forget folks. I’m sharing these posts not only because I like them. I’d really like to see them get support and upvoting.

Nominate Your Favourite Post

With all the chaff that I end up trying to sift through each time I sit down to do the Steemit Ramble, I think it is time to give you dear reader an opportunity to nominate your favourite reads.

Just put a link to a post you have found and really enjoyed in the comments.

This is NOT an invite to SPAM!

As much as you may love your own post, I am really looking for someone else to say, “Hey, I like this post, have a look”. When I post a Steemit Ramble, that is what I’m telling my readers.

I wont promise that I’ll agree with your choice but, I will promise to have a look at it and if I use it in the next Ramble, I’ll let you know in a reply to your comment.

Please Join the Curation Trail

If you’d like to support the posts I find and upvote while searching for the Ramble shares, please join my Curation Trail on Streemian

August 20 -- Steemit Ramble #111 -- Curating Great Posts for You