Get Spiked

Good times...

2010-05-14T20:28:00.002-04:00

It's been a good afternoon. The fact that it's Friday and I don't have to teach for 2 days definitely doesn't hurt.

After school today I was asked (or volunteered... or was asked to volunteer... I dunno) to help plan out the school-wide remediation plan and schedule for the next two weeks. So I spent a couple hours after school sitting with the principal and then I've been firing email back and forth with her all evening.

I realize that doing extra work is not normally cause for a good mood, but I've felt a little out-on-an-island for a good part of this year and having the principal ask for my help and then run not only logistical info (my strength) but also curriculum for gifted 3rd- through 5th- graders by me has been VERY validating.

Also, I think I'm gonna be teaching a bunch of kids to play chess and, possibly, Strat-o-matic baseball for the next two weeks. This could be very cool.

Laterz.

2010-05-11T06:46:00.001-04:00

Question of the day- I just brought Sugar-Free Amp energy drink for 79 cents. I understand that that's a loss leader and the store's not making any money off me today, but given that price, how can anyone justify 3 damn dollars for that tomato-paste-sized can of Red Bull? Does it contain liquid gold? I don't get it...

For those of you who think my ego is doubt-proof...

2010-05-09T20:12:00.003-04:00

I've spent a lot of time this year doubting myself. I know I spend a TON of time trying to do my job well, but I'm gotten very little feedback of any kind about the work I'm doing.

For this reason I'd like to thank my Curriculum for Gifted Students prof. She offered to write me a letter of recommendation any time I need one. And she based the offer on spending the last 8 weeks looking at my lesson plans and the projects and work that my students are doing.

For the first time in months, I feel like I actually know what the hell I'm doing. Of course now, if I tell my administrators to take a walk if they question anything, I may need that letter...

Laterz.

2010-05-09T20:03:00.001-04:00

Hey. I can post from my phone! Cool.

Let's try this again...

2010-05-09T19:23:00.003-04:00

I haven't blogged in almost 3 years. This is primarily due to the fact that I determined that no-one actually cared. I think I'm gonna start again. I assume that it's still true that no-one cares.

A quickie update/intro for anybody who's tuning in.

My fam and I live in the armpit of America. Armyville, NC. The fam is myself, my wife S.A., and my 2 boys- Sam and Pete.

S.A. and I are both teachers. She works with not-quite-middle-schoolers. I work with boogers-over-broccoli-eaters.

We always hold down a few extra jobs on the side and I'm perpetually enrolled in college classes. (A function of coming to teaching later-in-life with a degree that has nothing to do with education.)

For me, this blog is about to become my opportunity to vent, share stories, etc. It's my journal, just with an opportunity for feedback.

And truly, that's about it. Feel free to post comments and questions as the need grabs you.

We're about ready to take off...

2007-08-04T18:48:00.000-04:00

Hey all...

I realize it's been a long time since I blogged, but I really do plan to do better for the next while.

We're about ready to move. For those of you who don't already know, S.A. and I have both accepted jobs in Raeford, NC. Our stuff is actually on it's way there as we speak. We take off Tuesday morning and will be in our new house on Wednesday night.

Though we're bummed that we're moving so far from our families (900 miles, give or take.) we both really believe that this is the best thing for us. It enables S.A. to start teaching and, since we're both working for schools, we'll (hopefully) be able to come back to Michigan for summers.

I'm really thinking of the move as a reset button for our lives. And after years of drama, money troubles, job issues, school, etc... I'm ready for it.

We'll be starting a flickr group so no-one will miss out on any pictures of the Samster growing up. And I promise I'll do better with this blog. (I did find it amazing that people checked in over 200 times since my last post. To those of you who kept checking in, hoping against hope that there'd be a new posting, I have but one thing to say - Google Reader.)

Anyway, I just wanted to take a second to say thanks to everyone who's been supportive of us through this whole process.

Special Thanks to-
Both our families for being a huge help through the moving process.

Matt, Kev, and Casey for helping move that damn piano again.

All my peeps at Stepping Stones for pretending to miss me when I left and for taking such great care of my boyo.

And to everybody else that I'm forgetting to mention because I'm too worked up now.

We love you all.

Laterz

Sick Day

2007-06-02T21:01:00.000-04:00

As a parent, you find that rules become the most important part of your life. Whether it's things you MUST do, like read his 10 favorite books before bed every night, or thinks you MUST NOT do, like give him nuts or Diet Coke, it often feels like you don't really have to think very often when you're dealing with your child because there's probably a very definite rule established for whatever situation you face - so just do it.

A brief side note- The other day, a parent of a three-year-old told me that when their child misbehaves, Their punishment of choice is that their child doesn't get to have a book read to them before bed. My question to them was, "What does your child do that makes you want to turn them into an illiterate for the rest of his/her life?" Honestly, parents can be pretty stupid.

Anyway, as i said, my life is now based on rules. Except today. Today, my son is sick. Mr. Sam has been running a 102-degree temp for most of the last 24 hours. He's just kind of miserable. He has been unwilling to do much of anything but sit an whimper. To that end, my genius wife (and I say that with absolutely no sarcasm)decided that we were going to have dinner while sitting in the tub because he's been unwilling to eat all day and he was finally in a decent mood. Then, when he got out of the tub, even though we're WELL past his bed-time (between 6:30 and 7 pm) he was allowed to watch his new favorite Baby Einstein video. Understand that Sam's less that 15 months old. He is not, as a general rule, allowed to watch any TV at all. We're really trying to keep him away from the TV until he's at least 2, but there are times when he's really grumpy and I guess watch household animals interspersed with weird pet puppets once a month probably won't scar him to badly. Anyway, it certainly has been the ticket tonight.

Pictures of our evening follow-

Laterz.

Cop OD's on Pot Brownies

2007-05-16T20:47:00.001-04:00

This cop should have just called Sam's Godfather. He could have eased his mind...

Picture Day

2007-04-15T20:02:00.000-04:00

Sam just had his pictures taken for his first birthday. Just thought I'd share-

Chapter 115- Owen returns (with Poop Calls)

2007-03-21T20:20:00.000-04:00

It turns out I'm somewhat self-obsessed. I've spent the last yeay-and-a-half blogging about my job. To the best of my knowledge, not a single person has ever cared less about anything than they would about my job, yet I kept on writing about it because I really wnated to bitch.

I quit that job a month ago. I haven't blogged since.

Obviously, I don't have enough to bitch about now.

So today I've decided to blog again. I've been working in my son's day care for almost a month, now. It rocks. I look forward to going to work every day. I realize that none of you care, but it's important fr me to say it anyway, just so you understand that I'm not kidding when I say I don't have enought to bitch about.

I do, however, have good stories to tell from time to time.

The kids in my room range in age from 4 to 14 months. They have all sorts of hilarious little habits. For example, many of them have very obviously "tells" that let you know when they're pooping. Here are the best four.

4. Sam, age 11 months, (Yeah, my Sam...) will drop anything he's doing amd lie face down on the floor, spread-eagled. He then starts taking very deep breaths. Let him do that for about 1 minute and you know it's time to change his diaper.

3. Charlie, 10 months, can only poop while sitting up. If we notice that he hasn't had a BM yet on a given day, alkl we have to do it sit him up. He'll immediately turn very red in the face and start grunting. Then the room starts to smell.

2. Emily, 13 months, will go to the back corner of the room and hunker down. She doesn't like people to look at her, but it's hard to miss the grunting.

1. The funniest thing I hear every day is what Savanah's (7 months) mom refers to as her "poop call". You can tell she's trying to go because she starts this high-pitched keening whine. It even more obvious when she's finally successful because as she's finally squeezing it out she lets go like a very high-pitched air raid siren. "Woop woop woop!" Honest to God... It's so funny you could die.

I love my job.

Laterz.

People with conscience.

2007-02-23T13:55:00.000-05:00

It's been an interesting day. I hate the fact that our society is so celebrity-obsessed. It feels to me like the fact that we hang on every celebrity's word, breathlessly waiting to pounce on them at their first sign of weakness, says really negative things about us. (And don't tell me that I'm a hypocrite because I'm so quick to comment on politicians and, after all, aren't politicians celebrities, too? Politicians work for us. Watching and commenting on them isn't sad. It's called performance evaluation.)

This morning I read Dooce, and she wrote, without question, the best entry she's written in the time I've read her blog. It's about her reasons for not judging Britney Spears. I can't identify with her reasoning, having never suffered from post-partum depression, but I can certainly respect it.

Then, while home at lunch, I watch the episode of the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson I'd tivo'd on Monday Night/Tuesday Morning. His entire monologue was devoted to his reasoning for not making fun of her. It was tremendously heartfelt, sometimes funny, sometimes a bit scolding, tremendously eloquent, and, from start to finish, both touching and thought-provoking. Thank God to YouTube. It's 12-and-a-half minutes long, but it's worth it.

I've often said that I try (and regularly fail) to live my life in a way that would make my grandfather proud. Obviously Heather at Dooce and Craig both have/had great grandparents too.

ABCs of Music

2007-02-20T12:06:00.000-05:00

It's kind of strange. For months, I was up to my eyeballs every day at work. But since I expected for last Friday to be my last day of work here, I spent the week trying to get all my ducks in a row. As a result, since they asked me to stay on one more week, I don't really have a whole hell of a lot to do. Therefore, it's Meme time. I don't know where this is originally from. It's just one of the random things you sometimes find floating around the web.

List your favorite bands (or artists) from A to Z.

A. Alice Cooper
B. The Band
C. Colin Hay
D. David Lee Roth
E. Elton John
F. Fats Domino
G. George Harrison
H. Huey Lewis & the News
I. Ian Hunter
J. Jeff Lynne
K. Kiss
L. Little Richard
M. Moody Blues
N. New York Dolls
O. Ozzy Osbourne
P. Pete Townshend
Q. Queen
R. Randy Newman
S. Sex Pistols
T. Tom Petty
U. U2
V. Van Morrison
W. Warren Zevon
X. I thought of a couple bands, but nobody I'd willingly listen to.
Y. Yes
Z. ZZ Top

Beating her to the punch.

2007-02-19T09:01:00.000-05:00

S.A. and I have pretty divergent taste in movies. To be exact, we have a good friend who serves as each of our "date' when one of us wants to see a movies in which the other has no interest. However, there are lots of movie genres where our taste overlaps. Romantic comedies, as a general rules, tend to fit that category.

On Saturday, S.A. and I went on a belated Valentine's date to see Music and Lyrics. I have no doubt that she'll be posting a movie review in her blog at some point in the near future as she felt rather strongly about the film. But I thought I'd try to beat her to it, just to get my two cents in.

IMDB currently has the user ratings in the mid-6's for Music and Lyrics. We try to check out IMDB before seeing a movie. We find that those user ratings correspond more closely with how we feel than the movie reviews you read in the newspaper.

I felt that was just about right. S.A. felt it was about 5.5 too high.

Let me start by saying a couple things. If someone tells you it's predictable, they're right. If they tell you and both Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore play the same character that they play in every other movie they're in, I can't argue. If they tell you the supposedly "hit" music is less than spectacular, they're spot-on. The thing is, in my ever-so-humble opinion, it doesn't matter.

Now in the interest of full disclosure, I should make sure you all understand one thing. I would happily pay to watch Hugh Grant balance his checkbook. And though I think Drew Barrymore is pretty much talentless, watching her movies, for me, is a little like watching a 5-foot-tall glasses-wearing geek trying to play high-school basketball. I'm not saying he's any good, but I kind of root for him anyway.

The movie IS predictable. Very. It's not gonna win any awards. But I'm okay with that. I LIKE happy endings. I don't like movies with anti-heroes. I don't want to have to sort though symbolism. I respect more complex, nuanced romantic comedies like Lost in Translation. But I don't ENJOY them. So knowing that the two main characters would end up together and would write a hit song in the end before the movie had actually started was good by me. (And if you're now howling that I've slipped spoilers ::GASP:: into my movie review, shut up. If you're honestly interested in seeing this movie but don't already inherently know this stuff, you're an idiot, so I don't want to hear it.)

And as for the music... S.A. complained that the songs in the movie could never be hits because the faux-80s songs were cheesy and insipid. She felt that the supposedly modern songs would never succeed because they were tuneless and slightly insulting. I'm left to assume that she does not, in fact, own a radio. The 80s-style stuff sounded A LOT like a great deal of 80's music. The modern stuff was HORRIBLE. And it sounded EXACTLY like 90% of the crap you hear on the radio today. The "hit" song that Hugh & Drew supposedly wrote was insipid and cutesy and if it was recorded by a couple of the fine folks on American Idol, I guarantee it was be a huge hit. I apologize to anyone who's offended by this, but the vast majority of the music-listening public know absolutely nothing about music. They're not looking for Motzart. (Which is good, because they're not gonna find it anywhere.) And that's okay, too. I am pretty well musically-trained. And I downloaded the soundtrack last night, anyway.

Anyway, when it's all finished, Music and Lyrics is probably not going to make you think. But if you let it, it'll probably make you smile. Unless you're my wife. And she liked XXX, so i don't really care what she thinks.

Laterz.

Oooookaaaaayyyyy...

2007-02-16T15:48:00.000-05:00

And so it ends - not with a bang, but with a resounding "WTF???"

I gave my notice today. In all honesty, considering that A) my company doesn't generally accept 2-week notice and B) I'm truly kind of fucking them, I expected to be escorted from the building and deposited on a curb. Instead I get this email sent to all my co-workers.-

Owen is moving on to the education field where he will be warping young children’s minds!

In all seriousness, this is a great opportunity for him and we wish him much success. Meanwhile, he will be finishing off the semester, teaching for us in both Petoskey and TC for some computer classes at night, with possible classes down the road. His last day is next Friday, so if you have any on-going business with TLC, please contact him before then.

I don't get it. I've been treated, to be blunt, like shit for the past few months, but now that I'm leaving it's "Congratulations! Would you like to continue doing the part of your job you actually enjoy and be paid three times as much as you've been making?"

Honest to God... I need a drink.

Huh

2007-02-15T13:13:00.000-05:00

It occurs to me that I started blogging about a month after I started working with my current employer. I can't help but wonder if I'll do any kind of decent job keeping this thing up to date when I work somewhere that doesn't require me to sit in front of a computer with nothing productive to do for hours at a time.

Not that anyone really cares, I suppose.

I'm outta here! Well, almost...

2007-02-15T12:46:00.000-05:00

Let me start by saying thanks to everyone who dropped me a line to commiserate about my work situation. I truly appreciate the support. Even I didn't realize how stressed my has been making me until I reached the end of my week of vacation and realized that I'd forgotten to take my anti-depressants for a week and I still felt the best I've felt, mentally, in a very long time.
We had a tough weekend, as S.A. had to go to the emergency room on Saturday with severe abdominal pain and didn't emerge from the hospital until Tuesday, having had multiple gall stones removed and still needing another operation.

The good news is that I was officially offered a new job on Friday. Needless to say, I accepted. I'll be getting up earlier, paid ALOT less, and I'll no longer have the kind of job title that makes you want to hand out business cards. I couldn't be happier.

I'll be giving my notice tomorrow. It'll be one-week notice. I currently work for an agency that's notorious for accepting people's two-week notice and then cheerful escorting them out of the building. They're very concerned about corporate espionage. Someone should probably point out to them that employees would be less likely to sabotage them if they didn't treat people like shit. I'm giving one-week notice in an effort not to be a complete dick, but I couldn't afford to risk going two weeks with no paycheck.

On an unrelated note, my mouth f***ing HURTS. I had a dentist appointment this morning to put in a crown. I'd like to point out that my mouth felt FINE when I went into the dentist office. Only now that my "problem"is "fixed" and I in significant pain. Not only were they unable to get me completely numb, but now that what numbness I was blessed with has worn off, the entire right side of my face hurts. If any of you intrepid readers feels like driving to Northern Michigan to share any good painkillers, I won't argue.

Oh yeah, one more note- Dooce posted an entry yesterday that is one of the best descriptions I've ever read of why being a parent is so great. Don't miss it.

Anyhoo... It's up to 18 degrees today. A friggin' heat wave, so everybody enjoy the balmy weather. I'll check back in later.

Capitalism Sucks.

2007-02-01T16:46:00.000-05:00

Sorry I haven't been around for the past couple weeks. I know it's been way too long since I've written anything, if only because S.A.'s cousin Amy has blogged twice since I last wrote anything and she only blog's about once every 3 months or so...

It's been kind of stressful couple weeks. My job is kicking my ass. Everything we do is driven by the almight dollar. In itself, that's frustrating for me. I'd probably be a socialist, given complete choice in the matter. But what's worse is that even when our sole criterion for decision-making is "How much money will this make/cost us?", we can't even make rational decisions within that limited framework. Never in my life have a worked at an agency that was so penny-wise, pound-foolish.

What makes it worse is that they've spent thee past two weeks driving it home to me that my only value to the company is how much money I bring in to the company. My job title is EDUCATION COORDINATOR! I'm supoosed to be the educational arm of the company. Exempt from the nickel-and-dime crap. WTF???

Yesterday, I got email from my boss explaining to me that my priorities were screwed up because I stayed up at night with my 10-month-old son, who has an ear infection, and is not sleeping well right now. Evidently, my attempts to pull my weight on the family front (This is especially important right now, considering the fact that S.A. is student-teaching and really needs her sleep) inconvenience my boss, (who is, by the way, female) because she feels it's hurting my productivity. To quote- "believe it or not, although maybe not said, you’re not kidding anyone here, or in your personal life that you’re pulling it off."

As you might guess, I'm a bit pissed. Luckily, I'll find out in the next couple days if I'm being offered a new job. All indications look good. If that happens, I'll definitely take it, even though it pays less with worse benefits. And I'll definitely be leaving with no notice.

As far as I know, no-one from my company knows I have this blog. I suppose if I'm wrong, I'm probably getting canned for this entry. Well, at least I can hit 'em for unemployment.

F*** 'em.

F***ing f***ers.

p.s. It should probably be said that I truly like the vast majority of people with whom I work and so I certainly would never do anything to make their lives more difficult. My problems are all specifically with one person. F***er.

Silly rabbit...

2007-01-20T18:18:00.000-05:00

So, as it turns out, when King Arthur uses the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch to defeat the killer rabbit in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, it may not have been overkill after all...

Holy Crap...

2007-01-20T18:14:00.000-05:00

Every year I complain to S.A. that drivers turn into friggin' MORONS as soon as it snows. After seeing this, I think I may just stay indoors until spring.

Jeeezus.....

2007-01-16T14:57:00.000-05:00

Sometimes it's like I work in a alternate universe. I almost wish I was a cartoonist, because I'm pretty sure my office would make a good comic.

I just walked up to the front desk to tell the receptionist something. I witnessed a number of things that seemed a little out of the ordinary.

The receptionist (Hereafter referred to as "1".) was standing in front of the bathroom door, holding it shut, so as to make it difficult for her (and my) boss to get out.
My admin person (Hereafter referred to as "2".)was standing next to her giving her instructions about how to effectively grasp the doorknob.
1 noted "It stinks! Who farted???" 2 replied "Must be Gib!" (Gib is the owner, Dr. M. Neither of them would call him Gib to his face if their lives depended on it. Evidently they get more familiar when they see his taillight leving the parking lot.) Both of them proceeded to literally roll on the floor laughing.
1 jumped up and grabbed a matchbook, ostensibly to relieve the odor she'd complained about. 2 informed her that she's allergic to sulphur and would be in dire straits if a math was lit anywhere near her. I've never heard of anyone being allergic to sulphur. I am, however, smart enough to keep my mouth shut.

Side Note: 2 is also, by her estimation, allergic to all plants but, strangely enough, no animals, subject to debilitating headaches and backaches, and was, at an earlier point in her life, a member of the U.S. Army Special Forces specializing in Covert Ops. Very covert, obviously, because I don't recall there being many female Special Forces in the 80's. In fact, according to the Army, women are still prohibited from being in Special Forces. All that said, I have no doubt that 2 honestly believes she was in Special Ops. 2 is a very good admin person. She is, however, nutty as a fruitcake.

1 proceeded to light a match, cackling maniacally.
2 started running in circles in the lobby, hacking and coughing like a tubercular chain-smoker in a burning house.
2 ran down the hall to her office as 1 sat in her chair, screaming with laughter.

At this point I left to come back to my office. I really wish this kind of scene was a little more uncommon around here.

Laterz

Bits & Pieces

2007-01-09T09:01:00.000-05:00

The world's cutest child is sick again. He sees Dr. M this morning at 9:30. I'll keep everyone posted.

------------------------------------------------

It turns out that I'm very fond of Chile Picante Corn Nuts. I realize no-one cares, but I just felt like sharing.

I'm back

2007-01-03T15:52:00.001-05:00

So, two weeks later I checked back in...

---------------------------------------------------------

When I picked Sam up from daycare yesterday, one of the gals there told me that they couldn't stop laughing at his all day. She wondered if I could explain a rather peculiar behavior that he had been exhibiting.

It seems that every time one of the kids at day care began to cry, Sam would scoot over to them and yell in their face. He smiled the whole time, so he didn't seem to be upset, but he was very consistent about it.

Misc. Baby: "WAAAAAHHHHH!!!!"

Sam: "AAAHHHHHH!!!!!"

I was quick to blame S.A. who loves to play "the Yelling Game" with him. She defends herself by saying that Grandma (My mom, who was a preschool consultant and speech therapist for years.) says that you're supposed to repeat what babies say back to them, so when Sam vocalizes loudly, she just responds in kind.

Still the mental picture is just great.

---------------------------------------------------------

Last night, as she was feeding Sam, S.A. looked at Sam's hair and asked me "What was that haircut called that all the actors had in the 90's? You know the one George Clooney had that was short with a straight-line around the forehead? The Nero?"

"The Caesar, dear. Wrong emperor..."

Maybe y'all don't find it nearly as funny as I did, but I love the idea of the hairdresser who fiddled while Rome burned.

Life with Lloyd

2006-12-20T10:10:00.000-05:00

When I came in to work this morning, my admin person pointed out to me that we seem to have a new pet. Evidently she spent 20 minutes this morning talking to a new friend who, judging from the pile of paper shreds and peanuts sheds found there, lives behind one of my bookshelves. For no apparent reason, we've taken to calling him(her?it?) Lloyd.
When word got out to the rest of my office (All women, in case you wondered.) they immediately started calling for blood. Luckily, I was able to find a site that sells live-traps for mice. Dot's already ordered 2 of them, and she's started putting pieces of oatmeal cookie back by his nest, which he seems to be eating very quickly, so he's ready to hop into the trap when it gets here.
Now we're discussing whether we should get an office pet. I'm voting for a rat.
This may be the most encouraging sign about my workplace I've had in a very long time.

Instructions

2006-12-18T09:01:00.003-05:00

SA and I cleaned out and organized our filing cabinet yesterday. She has to help me with this stuff because, given my druthers, I keep EVERYTHING. Among all the flotsam and jetsam, we found a number of product manuals, just in case you can't remember how to use something you've owned for 5 years. Being as I was kind of looking over her shoulder, I had a difficult time figuring out what some of the manuals were actually for, and why I had kept them. Chief among those questions was, apparently, an instruction manual for a can-opener.

Though it turned out that I had misread the cover, all I could think was, "Good grief. Even I must think I'm an idiot."

Oh! My Bleeding Heart...

2006-12-18T09:01:00.001-05:00

Well. It's Office Christmas Party Season. Well, maybe it WAS Christmas Party Season. I know we're done with ours, thank God...

SA's party was last weekend. She works for a non-profit, so their Christmas party consists of a potluck supper at one of the employees houses. She gets a small gift/bonus every year - a gift certificate to use at any of a few local shops.

Saturday was my Christmas Party. I work for a decent-sized, very much for-profit business with a number of different small companies in 3 different town making up the whole that is our corporation. Our Christmas Party was Black-Tie-Optional. (Talk about misnomers... It's optional as long as you don't mind looking like a degenerate who has no idea of how to dress in polite company. My wife might disagree with me, but I counted three guys who weren't in at least a jacket and tie.) Anyway, as you'd guess, it was held at a major local country club and featured 3 different dinner selections, party favors that cost more than SA's bonus for each attendee, an open bar (Again, thank God.), a live band, and a concert from a local choral group. To top it off, we all received our Christmas bonuses. I receive a moderately small bonus, because I haven't' been with the company for very long. I found out that some administrators get many times what I got. My bonus was still TEN TIMES what SA got.

And amid all this ridiculously overblown merriment, complete with a multitude of melodramatic speeches about corporate synergy and how we are all one big family, all I could think was, How many poor f-ing families could we have subsidized Christmas for if we'd opted to have a f-ing pot luck????

Sometimes I HATE corporate America.

The reason I won't be reading ANYTHING by MIchael Chrichton anymore...

2006-12-15T08:46:00.000-05:00

Hey Gang. Sorry it's been so long. I've been, well.... I dunno. I've been busy, but not really any more so than normal. I guess I'm just a generally shitty blogger. I'll try to do better.

Anyway, I've got my undies in a bunch this morning, so I figured it was probably time to vent.

I love to read. As a general rule, I'll read just about anything, but my favorite genres tend to be fantasy/science fiction and suspense. Therefore, I've read just about everything that Michael Chrichton has written. Yes, I realize it's just pulp and that he's not a great writer, but his plot-lines are generally interesting and that pretty much all I ask.

No more.

It turns out that he's a right-wing wack-job. This, in itself, is not reason enough for me to stop reading his books. I have, after all, been to MANY Ted Nugent concerts. (I still have nightmares about cardboard cutouts of Janet Reno...) However, it also turns out that Chrichton's a totally socially-maladjusted, vindictive asshole. (Thank You to Think Progress for tipping me off to this.)

Chrichton is a vocal critic of Global Warming. (Maybe that's a bad way to phrase that. I mean, anybody with half a clue is a critic of Global warming. What? We should support it? What i mean to say is that Chrichton is the kind of scientific oblivious moron who doesn't think it exists. I say this as I look out my window on December 15th at green grass in Northern Michigan. ) In 2004, he release the novel State of Fear, wherein he depicts global warming as a a hoax concocted by environmentalists to raise money. He has since met with our Moron-In-Chief to discuss this and the two of them are in near-total agreement.

As a response to Chrichton's public stance on this subject, last March, New Republic senior editor Michael Crowley wrote a cover story called “Jurassic President: Michael Crichton’s Scariest Creation.” It talked about how dangerous this stance was, especially when it's held by the f-ing President.

From Think Progress-

Crichton’s response was to smear Crowley in his latest novel, Next, by writing in a character named “Mick Crowley” who rapes a two-year-old boy. The following is a graphic excerpt from Crichton’s novel (reader beware):

Alex Burnet was in the middle of the most difficult trial of her career, a rape case involving the sexual assault of a two-year-old boy in Malibu. The defendant, thirty-year-old Mick Crowley, was a Washington-based political columnist who was visiting his sister-in-law when he experienced an overwhelming urge to have anal sex with her young son, still in diapers. Crowley was a wealthy, spoiled Yale graduate and heir to a pharmaceutical fortune. …

It turned out Crowley’s taste in love objects was well known in Washington, but [his lawyer]–as was his custom–tried the case vigorously in the press months before the trial, repeatedly characterizing Alex and the child’s mother as “fantasizing feminist fundamentalists” who had made up the whole thing from “their sick, twisted imaginations.” This, despite a well-documented hospital examination of the child. (Crowley’s penis was small, but he had still caused significant tears to the toddler’s rectum.)

The real-life Michael Crowley is also a Washington journalist and also graduated from Yale.

Well, that's it for me. I absolutely HATE IT when people can't come up with a reasonable argument so they resort to name calling. And truly, I can't honestly think of anything worse to call someone than "child-rapist".

Even for all you right-wingers out there, (And again, what are you doing reading MY blog?) I can't imagine being willing to support anyone who behaves that way, regardless of his political views.

Good grief...

Congrats to me!

2006-11-28T13:35:00.000-05:00

Thanks to everybody who's tuned in this month to the blog. I've officially had my most hits ever this month.

Sorry...

2006-11-28T13:23:00.000-05:00

Hey gang. Sorry about the week with no entries. Life's busy and the blog just kind of faded into the background.

Life has mainly been focused on surviving Thanksgiving. We went down to Sam's Aunt Rachel and Uncle Jeff's house for dinner in G.R. on Thursday. Then we attended S.A.'s cousin Amy's wedding on Friday in Port Huron. Then SA and I went shopping in Detroit and Birch Run on Saturday.

Sam and I just vegged on Sunday.

Dinner was, as always, enjoyable. Jeff got a new Wii as an early Christmas present and we spent a good amount of time trying out all the different games on Thursday evening.

The wedding was nice. (Also, SHORT - which definitely lends itself to a good wedding ceremony, as far as I'm concerned.) A half-dozen of us sat in a corner chatting (and imbibing copious quantities of beer) for most of the evening before Jeff (H.), Jeff (or Joe, if you prefer), Dave, Holly, Amy's friend Amanda, and I went to the hotel bar to watch a one-man-80's-band perform (HORRIBLE). Then Amanda, the Jeff's, and I took off to Jack's Tavern until closing time, playing table-top shuffleboard and the like. I can't remember the last time I closed down a bar. Probably college. Anyway, good times.

Sam's ear infection is much better, but his first 2 teeth are coming in, so he's a bit pissy right now.

And I think that's about it. Thank God. I can't imagine anybody really cares about any of this, but I figured I'd better write something or I'd lose my loyal readership. :)

I promise next entry will be more interesting. Probably.

Laterz

Life is Good

2006-11-19T10:00:00.000-05:00

I can think of nothing nicer than rocking my 7-month-old son (who's recovering from yet another ear infection) to sleep.

Those of you who don't have children, you cannot even fathom what you're missing.

God, I'm lucky to be home to do this stuff. Sunday rocks.

Satisfying Lunch Breaks...

2006-11-17T12:06:00.000-05:00

Every day, I try to leave my office for the better part of an hour in order to regain a small piece of my sanity. Today, I met SA and Sam at the pediatrician's office (he has ANOTHER ear infection) so I could take Sam back to daycare while SA went to her Dr's appointment across town.
When we got to daycare, the ladies were just starting to feed all Sam's pals so it was a little bit lively in there and many very short people were vying for whatever attention they could get. I stayed for 20 minutes or so to help out. Okay, who am I kidding? I stayed because playing with babies (Mine, yours, anybody's...) makes me happy.
So Thank You to Ms. Cortney, Ms. Sherrie, and Ms. Jan for letting me stick around. I definitely felt much better when I left than I did when I got there.
Also, when I got back to my office, the receptionist has somehow acquired real, honest-to-God, 4-inch-high-bang-creation mall hair. It was great. I asked her if she'd like me to run out for scrunchies or jelly shoes to complete her ensemble.
I figure I don't need to regain sanity anymore because my co-workers are obviously joining me in my insanity.

LIfe notes

2006-11-14T10:27:00.000-05:00

My son (the Little Red Crustacean, if you read S.A's blog,) is a very unique little guy. Even though WebMD says it's highly unlikely, he has managed to contract strep throat. Since you're not suppose to get Strep until you're at least 3, I'm choosing to take this as further evidence that he's very advanced, rather than yet another indication that he's awfully sickness-prone.

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Sometimes I HATE my job. I just spent 15 minutes figuring out, via the phone, that one of my co-workers printer wouldn't work because it wasn't plugged in correctly. Even though we theoretically checked it 3 times. How do these people remember to breathe.

-----------------------------------------------------

Though most of us are not financial geniuses, if someone were to mention a "credit-debit" to you, would you not think they were a moron? Or at least have no f-ing clue what they were talking about? What about a "Britannical Garden"? I assume that must be where they grow the encyclopedia...

BitTorrent

2006-11-10T11:20:00.000-05:00

I love BitTorrent. I just thought I should mention that. I'm going to assume that, if you're reading my blog, you're already familiar with BitTorrent. For anybody who doesn't already know, it's a peer-to-peer file sharing program that allows you to download stuff from many different people at once. It basically makes sharing huge files much more feasible than it would otherwise be. For instance, you can download pretty much any episode of your favorite TV show if you missed it last week. (I know this because I had to download Studio 60 a few weeks ago. Slick.)

I know that many of you techies out there are yelling "It promotes Piracy!" and you're right, however, sometimes it's the only way to accomplish a goal.

Case-in-point- I had a client contact me asking if my company could teach her to use Adobe PageMaker 7.0. I have an instructor who's fluent in PageMaker, so he'd be able to teach her. The problem is that we don't have PageMaker in my classroom anymore and you can't buy it anymore, because Adobe quit producing it a couple years ago. Which is where BitTorrent comes in.

Using Azureus, (my BitTorrent client of choice) I was able to download someone else copy of PageMaker in a little less than an hour and use it to teach this person how to use it. And then I can throw it out we're done, because I don't need a copy of PageMaker.

Also, when it asked me to register the program when I installed it, I put in all my boss's contact information, so if Adobe wants to sue somebody for pirating their program, they'll know who to look at.

Affirmative action

2006-11-09T13:06:00.000-05:00

A little fair warning- This post is just off the top of my head. Some details contained in it may well change in the furute as new information presents itself to me. Just so you know...

---------------------------------------------------------

Well, SA blogged about Proposition 2 today and, as is invariably the case, somebody felt it necessary to cry out in the comments section that all the poor, beleaguered white men want is a fair shake, doggone it. Okay, I guess I'm paraphrasing a little. His (I'm assuming it's a him.) actual words were, “Every opponent that has spoken out about this proposal has failed to answer one simple question. Can you answer it? What is wrong with equal protection under the law?"

I don't feel as strongly as SA does about the necessity of affirmative action in employment. That's not to say I don't feel it's necessary, it's just saying that I won't be burning my bra about it any time soon. My feelings about affirmative action are much stronger in relation to higher education.

I grew up in a very small town in Northern Michigan. I graduated from high school with 54 students, all of them white. However, (even though my high school guidance counselor told me I was insane) I went to college in Miami, Fl. The biggest reason I left home was because I knew it was important for me to see something different. My parents instilled this in me from a very early age. Unfortunately, most people in the world are afraid of anything different.

I explain all this for a reason. The best part, I repeat- THE BEST PART of my college education is that I went to a school with a tremendously diverse population. I learned a HUGE amount about the rest of world and the way people experience it because I went to school with a whole ton of people who were VERY different from me. Had I gone to a small school in Michigan - Northern Michigan University is almost exactly the same size - I would not have had that experience, because, like most public universities in Michigan, Northern's student population is almost exclusively white.

One exception to the lily-white rule in Michigan is the University of Michigan. Michigan has admitted that they do weigh race into their admissions decision-making because they feel that diversity is an important part of a positive college experience. I'm sure that they'd rather not have to look at race but the problem is that, in the United States, minorities tend to be concentrated in urban areas and, unfortunately, inner-city schools tend to be inferior to their suburban and even rural counterparts. Because minority students often get an inferior high school education, to weigh their desirability compared to white students solely on their grades and test scores would not result in nearly as many minority students attending Michigan as the school wants. So they factor race into the equation.

Anti-affirmative action advocates often state that this is unfair to white students. They're wrong. By having a more diverse population, colleges provide a more positive experience for ALL their students. Also, for all the folks who say, "Now you have students in school who shouldn't be there because they didn't get a good enough education to be successful at a school like Michigan!" check the graduation rates.

Michigan, the lightning-rod for all the affirmative action controversy, has the highest graduation rate of any public university in the state. Not bad for a school that keeps letting all those "unqualified" students in. My guess (based on my personal experience) is that if you were to look at only the students who were specifically admitted to U of M based on affirmative action guidelines, you'd find that their grades and graduation rates were even better than the student body at large. Those folk tend to be the people who really want to be in college. They recognize the opportunity they've been presented with and don't want to waste it.

I guess my point is this, the day that everybody actually has an even playing field- when every student has access to the same quality of education - when Michigan voters decide that it might actually be important to give enough money to education to FIX it!!!- then affirmative action in college admissions won't be necessary. But until then, it's necessary. Period.

Holy Crap...

2006-11-09T09:12:00.000-05:00

We won.

And by "we", I mean rational, conscientious Americans as a whole. The American people have spoken and they say, (to quote Lou Dobbs - and I can guarantee this is definitely the first time we've quoted Lou Dobbs on my blog...) "[Washington,] Shut up and Listen!"

Democrats now have control of the House. They have control of the Senate. And Rumsfeld is FINALLY gone.

It's about damn time!

They FINALLY have the right people in enough positions of power that they can offset some of the moronic policies put in place by President Can't-tell-my-ass-from-a-hole-in-the-ground.

Now we pray that they don't screw it up.

Good grief...

2006-11-08T08:02:00.000-05:00

Well, it's not as bad as the last election...

American voters turn out in pretty good numbers (for a non-presidential-election year) to turn control of the House of Representatives over to the Democrats. As I type this, there are still 2 elections that are undecided, with Senate races in Virginia and Montana (Montana??? Seriously? The political fate of the country hinges on Montana?) being too close to call. At this point, though, it looks look for the Democrats in both of those races. If they do, in fact, win both races, they'll have control of BOTH houses and effectively block any other hair-brained schemes our Moron-in-Chief comes up with for the next 2 years.

Everybody cross your fingers.

On a more local note, Michigan voters somehow managed to elect the right candidate for most of the important positions, at least least those that directly effect Northern Michigan. Governor Granholm was re-elected. (Thank God...) Stabenow and Levin were re-elected to the Senate. Bart Stupak was re-elected to the State Senate. And Gary McDowell was re-elected to the state house by a landslide. Evidently most folks agreed with my "Jay Duggan is an ass" stance.

However, even though we elected most of the right people, we COMPLETELY screwed the pooch when it came to the various ballot proposals. In a state with a Democratic Governor and 2 Democratic Senators, we managed to effectively eliminate affirmative action and to declare that education is important to Michiganders, but not THAT important. So on a National scale, I'm pretty pleased this morning. On a local scale... Not so much.

Anyway, I'm sure I'll be checking back in throughout the day as new stuff happens. Good work people. At least the who friggin' country won't be controlled by right-wing-wackos now. Maybe we can start bringing some of our soldiers home now, before they get killed for no damn reason...

Everbody cross your fingers..

2006-11-07T20:00:00.000-05:00

Well, polling places have just closed in the east (including most of Michigan) so we just have to hope, now. To paraphrase my buddy Adam, in a few hours I'll know if I should put everything I have into leaving the country.

----------------------------------------------------

On an unrelated note, remember, when next you look at your wife/husband/boyfriend/girlfriend/significant other, tell 'em how much you love 'em. We all need to hear it from time to time.

I love you, S.A.

Reasons why Jay Duggan is an ass.

2006-11-03T16:47:00.000-05:00

We have a local election coming up. Among the races to be decided is the race for the 107th District of the Michigan State House of Representatives. The incumbent, Gary McDowell is a Democrat who ran last election on a pro- gun rights platform (obviously among many other things). This sticks out for me as I'm not a big fan of the pro-gun lobby. His opponent is Jay Duggan, a local Petoskey businessman.
There was never a chance that I was going to vote for Mr. Duggan, but I thought I read the absolute perfect reason to vote against him recently. My Duggan stated in a number of ads that he was endorsed by a national right-to-life organization. Obviously this classifies him as someone for whom I would not vote. But then it a tremendously humorous twist, the organization commanded him to stop saying he was endorsed by them, because they didn't want him either.
So he's pro-life (strike 1) but evidently so undesirable that even right-to-life groups don't want to claim him (strike 2) and on top of everything else he's a liar (strike 3 - shouldn't he be out by now? Maybe it's a foul ball. I guess being a liar may be a pre-req to being a politician.) and, since he put his lies out in the media where it was going to be EASY to get caught, he's obviously stupid. (That's it. You're outta here!)

Even you Republicans shouldn't be voting for this guy.

Sheesh...

Arguing with "The Voice of Reason"

2006-11-03T14:00:00.000-05:00

This afternoon's entry's title refers not to the fact that SA would tell me I've been doing just that ever since we got married, but instead, to the fact that yesterday's "Chickens*** Commenter" has decided it's time to lose to derogatory title. So he/she checked back in with more abortion-centered argument.

I'm not gonna go into detail rebutting him/her again, because, in all honesty, I really don't want my blog to turn into Spike's Online Crossfire.

Also, I can't figure if "Voice" is from Holland, MI, (which would explain A LOT. Holland is the Dutch Reformed Church capital of the US. When my dad (an Earth Science major) worked at a grocery store in Holland in the Early 70's, the butcher spent a great deal of time telling him that evolution was a bunch of bull. When my dad calmly asked him how he explained the preponderance of dinosaur bones found in the earth, the butcher exclaimed "God made the earth with big bones in it!" Logic like this can make it very difficult to argue with creationists. It also makes you wonder who let them all out of the loony bin.) or else from Cincinnati, OH. Truly, I don't really know a ton about Cincinnati, other than there must be something in their water supply, because their football players get arrested at a REALLY rapid rate.

Anyway, I'll give a little bit of credit to "Voice", if only for checking back in. Also, sir/ma'am, there's not too much danger of offending me by disagreeing with me about abortion. It's an issue that I wrestled with for a long time, so I can understand why some folks (my folks included, when last I checked, though it seemed like my mom might be wobbling a little) disagree with me. As long as y'all don't tell me what I should think, I'll mostly leave you alone.

And on that note- I declare a truce. At least until the next time the Conservative Christian right-wing wackos try to pass yet another law that's WAYYYYY to wide-ranging about abortion. (Yeah... I know. I couldn't let this post end without at least one more dig at the right-wingers. I'm a shitty person. Deal with it.)

p.s. Evidently some of my other readers weren't so easy-going about Voice's stance. I really appreciate the cardboard tube metaphor. I also love that they made the phrase "Food for thought," mean "Stop talking, you bloviating moron."

Political Podcasts

2006-11-03T08:58:00.000-05:00

In case any of you were unaware, iTunes offers a number of free political podcasts. You can download weekly addresses from a number of politicians (Barack Obama continues to be well-spoken, in case you'd wondered.) as well as a number of poiltically-themed news shows.

Great stuff to have playing at your desk at work.

Stealing Andrew Andrew's Meme

2006-11-03T08:23:00.000-05:00

1. What was the first CD/Record/Album/Artist you ever bought and what format was it in?
Guns ‘n’ Roses - Appetite for Destruction. That was the first CD. I couldn’t tell you the first tape. I had TONS of cassettes as a kid, but I don’t remember which, if any, of them I actually paid for.

2. How do you usually listen to music?
My iPod. 40 gigs of eclectic musical bliss.

3. What is your favorite genre of music and why?
Classic rock, but only because it’s different to find a genre that encompasses KISS, Elton John, Ringo, George Harrison, and Warren Zevon. (Maybe "Old Fogie Music"?)

4. What is your opinion on music video shows and music televion?
I truly cannot remember the last time I watched a music video. Ditto for awards shows.

5. Do you usually agree with who the winners of the Grammy Awards are?
The Grammy Award winners generally make me think that REAL musicians (see above) should have to approve every new artist who wants to record an album because everyone (okay, maybe not everyone, but let’s say 98% of the folks) recording today who’s under the age of 40 is a steaming pile of crap. (On a positive note- Weird Al just scored his first ever top-10 single. I guess maybe there’s a little bit of hope for the music industry.

One other note...

2006-11-02T15:24:00.000-05:00

Every time SA and I see one of those "Choose Life" bumper stickers, we comment to each other "Do you think those geniouses realize that they have a PRO-CHOICE bumper sticker on their car?"

Valid comments from chickens*** commenters

2006-11-02T14:46:00.000-05:00

I received a comment on yesterday's entry, "SA kicks ass."

The comment was left by "Anonymous" which completely pisses me off. If you are going to express an opinion, PUT A NAME WITH IT. Grow some cojones. I'm not saying you have to use your proper name (notice that mine does not show up anywhere on this blog) but put some identifier with your ideas so people can respond to them.

That said, here's the comment.

Anonymous said...

Doesn’t that onesie idea make you think about the alternative? It’s a pretty ugly thought. Anyway, why do you feel the need to polarize everyone you consider a “republican” into mindless Bush-drones. That’s almost as ignorant as pretending like it’s cool to have to have the right to pick and choose which babies are wanted enough to deserve a birthday.

I feel VERY strongly about abortion. If you want a more complete explanation of those feelings, read my entry from the Roe v. Wade Anniversary. Or better yet, read SA's, also from Jan 22nd. She got quite a bit of national blog press for hers. But here's my quickie response to the comment.

There are 3 separate issues addressed here. So allow me to respond to them in order.

1. I think about the alternative all the time. My son is a miracle. We did not think we'd be able to have him, so I'm incredibly thankful for every moment I'm with him. Personally, I'm totally against abortion. I just don't feel that my personal feelings should dictate the law.

2. My habit of "polariz[ing] everyone [I] consider a “republican” into mindless Bush-drones" is certainly over-simplifying things. I currently vote mostly (though not completely) along Democratic Party lines even though I disagree with a few issues here and there, because I strongly agree with the major issues. I don't accuse most people who read my blog (especially those who take the time to comment) of being "mindless". On the contrary, people who agree with the current Republic stance on abortion are "myopic and self-centered" and people who agree with their stance on Gay rights and diversity issues are "bigots".

3. Anyone who suggests that anything related to abortion is "cool" is an ass. However, living in a country where we get to make decisions about ourselves for ourselves, IS "cool". Christ... Lately it's about the only good thing I can say about living here. (BTW- That, too, was hyperbole, lest it be otherwise lost on you.) And again, if you really want a detailed explanation of why I'm Pro-Choice, read my Roe v. Wade entry.

Alright, back down off my soapbox. At least for a little while.

Oh yes... Thanks for commenting. Please come again. (Seriously.)

Just takin' a survey...

2006-11-02T13:35:00.000-05:00

2 things-

1. Remember that next Tuesday is voting day. For those of you who are too lazy to wait in a big 'ol line in order to vote, go get an absentee ballot, pronto. I went over at lunch (telling the nice ladies there that I'd be out of town on Tuesday) and they not only gave me my absentee ballot, but they let me fill it out right then so I have already voted in next Tuesday's elections. So now you have even fewer excuses to not vote. Go do it. NOW.

2. One of my favorite parts of writing this blog is tracking who's reading it. My tracker lets me see a quite a bit of information about my readers, but it does not give me names. I'm able to figure out who most folks are by their location. I've thought about putting in a guest book, but it seems kind of cheesy and I only start to pay attention when somebody's been in a few times. I have one question.

Who is reading my blog in Carson City, Nevada? I know that you connect to the web via the Official State of Nevada Web Site. I just looked at the site and there's a picture of Governor Kenny C. Guinn and this man is obviously a Republican, so now I'm concerned. Am I on some sort of watch list just becuase I'm pretty sure our moron-in-chief has a difficult time remembering how to tie his shoes? I have to know! So leave a comment. Please. I HATE not knowing stuff...

SA kicks ass.

2006-11-01T16:18:00.000-05:00

My wife has decided she wants to make a one-sy (one-sie? How the hell are you supposed to spell that? You know, the one-piece oufit that babies wear...) for Sam that says "My mom is Pro-Choice. She chose me."
It's times that this that really make me love her.

Also, voting day is coming up. Remember, Republicans don't care about you. (Unless you're a multi-millionaire. Then they're more than happy to kiss your ass. And seriously, if you're a multi-millionaire, what're you doing reading my blog?)

Deep thoughts

2006-11-01T16:08:00.000-05:00

Andrew Andrew says in his "about me" section on his blog that he's "trying to find my path through life." It occurs to me that I don't really want a path through life as much a a path in it. Preferably one that doubles back on itself.
I don't like to think that I'm moving through life. The idea that I'm (in all probability) more than a quarter of the way through it is depressing. I'm in no hurry to be done. I still don't know what the f*** I'm doing.

Halloween with a sick crustacean.

2006-11-01T08:23:00.000-05:00

Well, last night was Halloween. Truly it kind of snuck up on me. S.A. bought Sam's costume in July, I think, and since then, it really didn't come up in conversation. Yesterday morning, we realized what day it was and immediately set about figuring out what to do for the evening.

Sam, as you may assume, really couldn't have cared less. The whole "Boatloads of Candy" thing doesn't really interest him since he doesn't have any teeth. Also, he's been feeling like crap, so we weren't willing to have him out-and-about in the cold for the evening. However, S.A. was bound and determined to show off his costume so we finally decided to meet up with my folks and take him to a few select houses and business in order to show him off.

He had a Dr's appointment in the afternoon in order to get his 6-month vaccinations, but when we took him in, Dr. M wouldn't let him have them because he has... Drumroll please... yet another ear infection. One good/bad thing about Sam is that he doesn't show you that he's sick during the day. He laughed and play with the pediatrician all through the appointment even though the his poor right eardrum actually elicited some "blue' language from the doctor.

Anyway, we took him out trick-or-treating to those few houses and a good time was had by all. (Even though we had to take him out of his costume every time we got in the car because, as it turns out, car seats don't work when you have a big red tail.) He was a charmer the entire evening; smiling, laughing, and clapping on command.

He waited until we got home to get grouchy and keep us awake all night.

I'll put some pics up this evening. Check back in later.

4 Things Blog Meme

2006-10-31T13:46:00.001-05:00

Four jobs I’ve had:

Store manager - Blockbuster Video
Statistics Teaching Assistant - Barry University
Assistant to the Director of the Speakers Bureau - Florida Marlins
TAPESTRY Assistant - C.O.P.E.S.D.

Four movies I can watch over and over:

Four places I’ve lived:

Burt Lake
Miami Shores
Lansing
Mt. Pleasant

Four TV shows I love to watch:

The Daily Show w/ John Stewart
Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
Grey's Anatomy
The Soup

Four places I’ve been on vacation:

The Badlands
Baseball and Boardwalk
Duck
Los Alamos

Four of my favorite dishes:

Chili
Aunt Marie's Zuchini Casserole
My Dad's Mac 'n' Cheese
S.A.'s Pot Roast

Four sites I visit daily:

Four places I’d rather be right now:

Home
Keith Ronk's Garage
The Cottage
Miami

Four bloggers I’m tagging:

Andrew Andrew
S.A.
Amy
Sorry, I'm only tagging 3.

Blogger Beta

2006-10-31T09:52:00.000-05:00

Blogger Beta finally let me move my blog over this morning. This allows me to apply "tags" to my entries that tell y'all what specific stuff is about. (For instance, it's fun for me to look back through all the stuff I write about S.A.) All I have to do is to go back to every entry I've ever posted and decided how I was to tag it.

As you might guess, I'm not getting ANY work done this morning.

Election Day is Coming Up

2006-10-31T09:38:00.000-05:00

I borrowed this from Ken Levine, who took it from Larry Gelbart. I don't think either of them would mind.

For Election Day – Lest We Forget

Iraq
Iraq
Iraq
Abu Ghraib
Guantanamo
Evil Doers
Evil Do Gooders
Terrormercials
Outsourcing Jobs
OutsourcingTorture
Quitting International Criminal Court
The Kyoto Protocol
The Geneva Conventions
Leaving Habeas Corpus for Dead
Civil War Abroad
Uncivil War at Home
Sound Bites
Unsound Policies
Unremorseful
Unregretful
Unrepentant
The Middle East Mess
The Middle Class Collapse
Predictably Unprepared
Perpetually Unequipped
Unmatched Ignorance
Unbridled Arrogance
Unwarranted Phone Taps
Unprecedented Powers
Compassionate Imperialism
Faith-Based Fascism
Total Dicktatorship
700 Club
700 Mile Border Fence
Over 700 Presidential Signing Statements
Unmatched Incompetence
Unparalleled Corruption
Ethic Cleansing
Governor Bob Taft
Governor John Rowland
Governor Bill Janklow
Oversight
Overlook
Stuff Happens
Stuffed Shirts
Tailored Suits
Tailored Stories
24/7 Spin Cycle
Executive Privilege
Privileged Executives
Wordsmiths
Warsmiths
Surrogate Samurais
Draft Dodging Doges
Potomac Pattons
A Coven of the Craven
Representative Tom Delay
Representative Roy Blunt
Representative Ken Calvert
Representative John Doolittle
Representative Jean Schmidt
Representative Jim Gibbons
Representative Tom Feeney
Representative Patrick McHenry
Representative Christopher Shays
Representative Katherine Harris
Representative Barbara Cubin
Representative Joe Barton
Representative Jerry Lewis
Representative Gary Miller
Representative Marilyn Musgrave
Representative Richard Pombo
Representative Rick Renzi
Representative John Sweeney
Representative Charles Taylor
Representative Curt Weldon
Representative J.D. Hayworth
Representative Don Sherwood
Representative John Patterson
Representative Rodney Alexander
Representative Roy LaHood
Representative Bob Beauprez
Representative Bob Ney
Representative Randy Cunningham
Representative Chris Cannon
Jeff Gannon
Representative Mark Foley
Representative Dennis Hastert
Representative Jim Kolbe
Representative John Shimkus
Representative Tom Reynolds
Over Paid
Over Reaching
Over Logging
Under Armored
Under Suspicion
Beneath Contempt
Senator Bill Frist
Senator George Allen
Senator Conrad Burns
Senator Joe Lieberman
Senator Rick Santorum
Senator Trent Lott
Senator James Inhofe
Senator Pat Roberts
Senator Sam Brownback
Rubber Stamps
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Billions Missing in Iraq
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Iraq
Iraq
Iraq

Health-Conscious Strip Joints

2006-10-26T13:21:00.000-04:00

We're going downstate this weekend for a bachelor and a bachelorette party. The latter is really a misnomer. I'm not sure what the specific qualifications are for a bachelorette party, but I'm pretty sure that having the bride-to-be's Grandpa and Grandma in attendance pretty much disqualifies it.

I'll be attending the bachelor party. Actually, it sounds like we're playing disc golf, having a cook-out, and either watching a baseball game on TV (assuming the Tigers don't lose the next 2 games) or a hockey game in person. To my way of thinking, this means that someone planned a bachelor party without actually talking to the groom-to-be, because I have to assume that no red-blooded American male is gonna okay a bachelor party for himself that does not, in any way, involve strippers. This is, after all, quite possibly the last opportunity for him to view, let's say, assets which do not belong to his bride-to-be.

Being the good friend that I always try to be, I decided to do a little research in order to to formulate a backup plan. (You know, in case he yells "This is a bachelor party! I want assets!")

As Grand Rapids is a pretty conservative place, I was concerned that there might be a scarcity or decent adult-oriented establishments. Silly me.

It turns out that there are a couple site that review strip clubs. Also, they do not involve NSFW pictures, which I found interesting. Obviously these are sites for folks with a purely academic interest in strip clubs. (Unfortunately, the names of the sites are NSFW, so I was glad I was doing the research on my wife's laptop sitting in the periodical room at the library. You don't really want sites like "strippers-r-us.com" popping up in your history at work.) Anyway, it turns out that G.R. does, in fact, have a very highly thought of establishment called the Red Barn Adult Theater.

Among its other selling points was one that stood out for me. Since it's illegal in Michigan for an establishment that features full nudity to have a liquor license, the Red Barn features a juice bar!

I think this is great. It's much easier to convince your significant other to allow you (And to all of you guys who are saying to yourselves "I don't need anybody's permission to go anywhere!", you are obviously not married, so shut up.) to visit a strip joint if you tell her that you promise to be very health-conscious while you're there.

Which leads me to a related story.

Years ago, when my buddy Kev was in college, he and a few pals enjoyed a guys-night-out which included visits to multiple bars and a strip joint or two. The next day, while all the guys were feeling a bit under-the-weather, one of the guys looked particularly bad. One of his eyes was swollen half-shut. Since none of the guys really had perfect recollection of the entire evening, they couldn't figure what he'd done do give himself the beginnings of a shiner, but they weren't particularly concerned. However, as the eye got worse over the following couple days, they all convinced him that he should see a doctor.

The diagnosis was a bit, well, icky. It turns out that the gentleman had a pubic louse in his eye. Evidently a product of enjoying too many lap-dances from gals who didn't enjoy showers.

Luckily, I feel confident that kind of thing doesn't happen at clubs with juice bars.

Laterz.

May the force (play) be with you.

2006-08-21T08:41:00.000-04:00

What do you get when you combine baseball and Star Wars? (Besides the bad pun in this post title...)

Whitecaps baseball on Friday night!

We took Sam to the Whitecaps game on Saturday. (We being S.A. and me, along with Sam's Grammy, Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Jeff, Aunt Rachel, Cousin Dave, Cousin Holly, and Cousin Joe.)

The game itself was uneventful, but it was Star Wars night at the ball park. Hence the following picture-

Notice how serious he looks. I suppose holding an entire
galaxy under the tyrannical thumb of the Emporer is serious work.

Job security

2006-08-14T11:40:00.000-04:00

I just got word that, after months of bitching, the powers-that-be have just ordered me $8000 worth of computers and digital projectors.

Considering the fact that no-one else in the office has a clue how to hook one of the new machines up, much less teach someone else how to use one, I guess this means I won't be getting fired this week.

Music so great it advances evolutionary theory

2006-08-11T12:21:00.000-04:00

My son (who's 4 months old today) has a new favorite song.

The New York Dolls have released a new album and the first single is called "Dance Like A Monkey" and it's actually about the evolution/intelligent design/creationism debate.
Also it has a good beat and the way my wife dances to it when playing with my son is the funniest damn thing you've ever seen. (She would not let me videotape it. Sorry.)

You can check the video out here.

Laterz

Sports traditions

2006-07-26T08:52:00.000-04:00

I remember a time as a kid, when I was playing little league, that I found myself involved in a little bit of a hot streak. 20 years later, I remember the streak itself much less clearly than I remember hiding my socks from my mom after every game because, as any sports fan knows, you don't wash your socks during a hot streak!

This came tom mind today because there's a neat article in the Detroit Free Press about sports traditions. It talk about where they came from and what they mean. For those of you who aren't sports fans, they probably won't mean anything to you (other than possibly giving you a little bit of insight into the slightly warped mind of the sports nut).

And for anybody who takes the time to click over to the article but thinks they're all silly, you should understand how deeply these concepts take hold and the fond memories they engender for some of us. My wife will attest that I still cry every time I hear a clip of Harry Carey singing "Take me out to the Ballgame".

Here are a couple that I would have to add to the list. They won't mean anything to most of you, but for a few, should at least make you laugh.

1. If you have a Jacksonville Jaguars hat, it always goes under you left foot during a tight volleyball game.
2. Nobody wants to be a monkey as much as Marcy P. And the "Theme of the Royal Canadian Kilted Yaksmen" is always good luck.
3. Always put a handful of sunflower seeds in your mouth at once. Make sure to spit the shells through the fence. Extra points for hitting the umpire.
4. "I don't want you to be sorry. Just do better."

That's about all I can think of right this moment. Feel free to add if y'all have any other bright ideas.

Laterz.

And the President can't figure out why the economy is a piece of shit...

2006-07-25T12:00:00.000-04:00

I (I, in this case, meaning my office.) got hired to do a small job recently. A small company, which is currently trying to rapidly expand, hired me to create a 20-odd page powerpoint presentation that they can use when presenting their products to potential customers.

It's not a bad job; it's just somewhat time consuming.

I have to say, though, that it's a little odd to be paid about $1000 for a job that could proabably be performed by the average 6th grader.

No wonder 90% of small buinesses fail within 2 years.

Of exhaust pipes and role models...

2006-07-24T08:27:00.000-04:00

This weekend, I installed a new exhaust pipe on my car. To those of you who are "car guys" (or "car gals"), this probably doesn't seem like a big deal. However, being as I'm the kind of person who calls AAA when I have a flat tire, successfully replacing a major piece of hardware on my car was a major personal victory.

I had a bit (okay a lot) of help installing the pipe from a family friend who, in a former life, was the head mechanic at a local dealership. He now has a very well equipped auto shop, for his personal use, at his house. Since our families have been friends forever, (He's my best friend's dad.) I felt comfortable calling him on a Sunday afternoon and requesting the use of his shop.

As it turns out, I also made good use of his expertise. I think he was afraid I'd hurt myself (or, more likely, his shop) if he didn't help. At any rate, we successfully changed the pipe and my car no longer sounds like a Harley with a badly tuned carburetor.

His assistance gave me pause to think, however. I'm nearing 30 years old. I have a 3-month-old son. I've been married for almost 6 years. By any legal or even logical definition, I'm an adult. The thing is, regardless of how many "adult" activities I participate in, I still don't feel like a Grown-Up.

I think this is due, at least in part, to the fact that there are a number of "Grown-Ups" that I admire and look up to. And it feels like, if I'm looking up to a number of people, then I must, logically, be down. And I guess that's okay.

In a culture where sarcasm and detachment are the qualities that men are supposed to strive for in order to be cool, (especially when any apparent affinity for any other male will be derided by the homophobic masses as "gay",) I've been extremely lucky to have a number of invaluable male role models in my life.

(In case you haven't noticed, I'm using my blog as my online diary today. If you don't have any interest in the kind of stuff I'd write in a journal, please feel free to stop reading and check in tomorrow. I'm sure I'll be back to the useless, but slightly comedic dribble that I normally write.)

So these are my Thank-You's to a few guys who I look up to. (Sorry about ending that sentence with a preposition, but "... guys up to whom I look." seemed a bit ridiculous.)

Keith- Thanks for showing me that not running the rat race doesn't have to mean running against it. Sometimes it just means ignoring it and doing your own thing. Quiet competence is a very cool thing when more people you know spend way too much time blowing their own horn.

Rick- Thanks for demonstrating to me that anyone who says things like "Once a screw-up, always a screw-up," is an idiot. You were one of the first people I met who made it clear that I didn't need to know everything yet. I could pick it up as I went along.

Fletch- Thanks for being honest. At a time in my life when I was incredibly disillusioned with the whole world's fixation on artifice, you showed me that honesty, while not necessarily being the most trouble-free option, was indeed the best policy.

Jeff- Thanks for being the youngest Grown-Up I know. There are times, when I'm very frustrated with myself for not getting to where I want to be, that you give me a little bit of hope. (And though I realize it weirds you out a little that I look up to you when we are, at least chronologically speaking, roughly equal. You seem to deal with it well.)

Pop- Thanks for showing me who I can, with a lot of work, be. I know you're not perfect. Far from it, actually. But the older I get, the more it seems like I'm becoming like you. And that's definitely a good thing.

Grandpa- Thanks for showing me who I should try to be. You're the only person I've ever know whose priorities were ALWAYS in the right place. I'll never be able to live up to the example you set, but I'll always try.

Laterz

Anagrams

2006-07-24T08:18:00.000-04:00

Andrew Andrew wrote a quickie blog the other day involving anagrams. I love anagrams. (Too many years of reading Dave Barry, I guess...)

I checked out the site he referenced and had to share one of the anagrams created for me.

From this point forward, the agency for whom I toil (The Learning Center of Northern Michigan) shall be known as-
On fertile, trenchant greenhorn. I'm aching.

So true. So true.

And speaking of editors...

2006-07-19T15:57:00.000-04:00

I received a call today at work from a gentleman who was having some difficulty getting MS Word to work the way he wanted it to. He was trying to put a header at the top of his first page that was different from the header at the top of all his other pages.

This is a little bit unusual, but not a particularly complicated problem. I could have walked him through a couple different ways to fix it but I figired it'd be faster if he just emailed it to me and let me fix it for him.

When I sent the file back to him, I laughed and offered him my name, which I had neglected to do in our initial conversation since we really had gotten right down to work. He, of course, reciprocated with his name.

I turns out that the gentleman I just showed a very simple word trick to - the kind of trick most 5th graders could do today - was turning in this paper as his final project for his MASTER'S DEGREE in education.

Worse yet- He recently retired from his previous job. He had been the editor of the local paper for the past 25 years.

The Problem With Editors

2006-05-16T07:21:00.000-04:00

Dear "Anonymous"-

Thank you for taking the time to read and post a comment on my blog. I certainly appreciate all my readers and the opinions they express.

In response to your comment from last night at 9:30pm, I offer the following notes.

I said that the situation was "on the periphery" of my life. Nowhere did I say that I wasn't "involved." To quote the editors, "We're ALL involved!"

Additionally, you're probably right. I probably should listen to my editors more. For example, my editor wouldn't allow me to make any retorts about the importance of grammar and spelling in anything that's posted for others to read. So I won't.

Also, they've made it very clear to me that, in journalism, one should never pay attention to an anonymous source, as anyone who's unwilling to go on record and be held accountable for what they say is obviously not a credible source.

As I say. I've got smart editors.

p.s. If you're reading this and it is about you, WELCOME! As I already said, it looks like life may be about to get exciting.

Efficiency

2006-05-15T15:33:00.000-04:00

In the interest of getting the word out as expeditiously as possible-

Junior will be baptized on August 6th. Be there or be square.

(In all seriousness, Barry Gang, ya gotta be here. The kid's got a whole pile of Aunts and Uncles that he needs to meet! Also, Michigan is beautiful in August. Remember the wedding?)

Frustration

2006-05-11T10:59:00.000-04:00

(My editors are concerned that someone might read this next blog entry and think that I might be fuming at them. In all seriousness, the people this is about don't know I HAVE a blog. Otherwise, how could I spout off about them?)

There's some crap going on, sort of on the periphery of my life, that REALLY torques me off. Unfortunately, it's not technically any of my business so I can't say anything to anybody about it. But I'm telling the whole world right now, a few people I know deserve a giant "Shut the f*** up."

I'm a pacifist by nature, but there are definitely times when there's no better way to communicate than with an uppercut to the jaw. Since that's not socially acceptable, allow me to say to all those who are negatively affected by the a**holes in their lives- Don't let the f***ers get you down.

Also, my father-in-law owns an 8-foot cannon, should you need to borrow it.

Note of the day

2006-05-02T07:57:00.000-04:00

S.A. gave be a bit of grief this morning because I didn't have any breakfast. I didn't feel this was exactly a crisis, as I gained 40 pounds while she was pregnant with Junior (I've lost 15 since he was born), but I figured I could probably use some sort of energy source for my day so I stopped at Big Apple Bagel for a coffee on my way to work.

It turns out that the Cinnamon Toast Latte is really good. Also, if you flirt a little with the gal at the counter, she'll give you a large CTL for the price of a regular coffee.

I may not have eaten yet today, but at least I fed my ego.

Welcome to the world, Sonny Boy!

2006-04-14T13:59:00.000-04:00

I promise that I'll now be much better about blogging, if only because I now have more to write about.

I could write a long blog here about the unbelievable week I've had (and I probably will later) but, for now, I'm just gonna post a picture. I think it pretty much says everything.

Conversations You're Glad Took Place on Instant Messenger rather than on, say, Speaker Phone

2006-02-13T08:15:00.000-05:00

This is a partial transcript of a conversation I had this morning on Instant Messenger.

[07:39] JoesGolfWorks: Good morning, my friend!
[07:42] zaphodbb1: good morning :)
[07:43] zaphodbb1: You're in a good mood.
[07:43] JoesGolfWorks: I'm faking it. :)
[07:43] JoesGolfWorks: I've decided to be perky this morning.
[07:43] zaphodbb1: Wheeee
[07:43] JoesGolfWorks: Because the alternative is biting people.
[07:43] zaphodbb1: Can't you do both?
[07:44] JoesGolfWorks: Yes. But now the biting will be a real surprise to my victims.
[07:44] zaphodbb1: Don't they always say that it takes more muscles to frown than it does to smile and bite?
[07:44] JoesGolfWorks: Something like that.
[07:45] zaphodbb1: I haven't left home yet, so my smiles are real.
[07:45] JoesGolfWorks: Lucky bastard.
[07:45] JoesGolfWorks: What time do you normally get to work?
[07:46] zaphodbb1: Around 9
[07:46] JoesGolfWorks: Ah.
[07:46] JoesGolfWorks: No wonder you're smiling.
[07:47] zaphodbb1: Working 9 to 5, as Dolly Parton says. Or Polly Darton, if you're in a Sesame Street mood.
[07:47] JoesGolfWorks: :) Which I am.
[07:47] zaphodbb1: And that's why we're such good friends.
[07:47] JoesGolfWorks: LOL
[07:48] zaphodbb1: Did you do anything this weekend?
[07:48] JoesGolfWorks: Nope. Just worked in the shop, getting ready for spring.
[07:49] zaphodbb1: That's right, you have seasons up there in Canada.
[07:49] JoesGolfWorks: We do.
[07:50] JoesGolfWorks: To quote the popular saying, "9 months of winter and 3 months of bad sledding."
[07:50] zaphodbb1: Whoo, you wacky yoopers.
[07:50] JoesGolfWorks: :)
[07:50] JoesGolfWorks: Did you see that Dick Cheney shot someone?
[07:50] zaphodbb1: Yes ... and the guy's doing fine, which means the news can make fun of it all they want.
[07:51] zaphodbb1: Doing anything for V-day?
[07:51] JoesGolfWorks: No plans. Flowers sent to the office, etc.
[07:51] JoesGolfWorks: She can't go out tomorrow because she has a breast-feeding class.
[07:52] zaphodbb1: Ah, the classic Valentine's Day excuse.
[07:52] JoesGolfWorks: I'm nothing if not original.
[07:53] zaphodbb1: How did people manage before there were classes?
[07:53] zaphodbb1: I imagine it was chaos.
[07:53] JoesGolfWorks: I have no idea.
[07:54] JoesGolfWorks: I suspect that guys were a great deal happier before Lamaze.
[07:54] JoesGolfWorks: Talk about videos you do NOT want to watch...
[07:55] zaphodbb1: The book was better?
[07:56] JoesGolfWorks: We have LOTS of books and none of them have THOSE pictures.
[07:57] zaphodbb1: Clearly you don't own Curious George and the Lamaze Class.
[07:57] JoesGolfWorks: This is true.
[07:58] zaphodbb1: Or maybe it was Llama's Class. Something like that.
[07:59] JoesGolfWorks: I had a book as a kid, called A Foal is Born, that starred, in a very significant role, Horse Placenta.
[07:59] JoesGolfWorks: I remember thinking, "Thank God people hired the stork to take care of this crap."
[08:00] zaphodbb1: That's slightly horrifying.
[08:00] zaphodbb1: From the producers of Summer of Sam comes ... Horse Placenta
[08:01] zaphodbb1: In a world ...
[08:01] zaphodbb1: "You'll never take me alive, Horse Placenta!"
[08:01] zaphodbb1: Starring Samuel L. Jackson

I suppose it's good that I get these conversations out of the way before I see any actual people. Most folks would be permanently scarred by talks like this.

Laterz

Working from home.

2006-02-10T15:28:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I decided to leave work at 9:30am because I wasn't feeling well. I figured it was okay because I only had a couple of telephone trainings to conduct and I figured I could do them from home as well as I could from the office. In other words, I figured I'd spend an hour or 2 on the phone and then relax all afternoon.

Oh, the best laid plans of Mice and.... whatever.

I was training from 10am to 4pm and then did a bit more in the evening (though not much, because my trainee thought I sounded too sick, so she told me to go to bed. Sarah laughed quite hard about that.)

So much for my nice relaxing day.

Today's been better, however. I scheduled a few trainings, but the morning was a quickie and I passed off my afternoon job to another trainer, which has given me enough time to shuffle a few papers around on my desk and read the Freep online.

I also took S.A. out to lunch because I was concerned that she was going to kill everyone at her office if I didn't. And to repay me, she has referred to me in her blog today as her manservant. It's good to know where you stand, I guess.

Laterz

I'm sick.

2006-02-09T08:59:00.000-05:00

In this case, I mean that completely literally.

I've been fighting off a cold for a few days and I seem to be losing the battle. I slept in the guest room last night in no small part because S.A. can't take any meds and I didn't want to make her sick. Unfortunately, the guest bed is not nearly as comfy as our bed so I didn't sleep particularly well.

I'm supposed to be conducting trainings via telephone all day today, so I thihnk I might go back home and do them from there. It's still work, but it doesn't suck nearly as badly when I get to do it while wrapped in an afghan sitting on my couch.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it,) my office does not have call forwarding, so I can't forward all my calls home. It'd be convenient, but I guess it'd probably piss me off to be getting calls all evening tonight before I come back into work tomorrow to turn off the forwarding. I guess I'll have to make due with checking my voicemail.

Luckily, I don't think I have anything in TiVo, so I shouldn't be tempted to watch TV instead of actually working.

Laterz

Really long-ass Blog Meme

2006-02-07T14:35:00.000-05:00

10 Favorites

Favorite Color: I'm kind of into Pink
Favorite Food: Aunt Marie's Zuchini Casserole
Favorite Month: May. It's starting to warm up and I have lots of golf ahead of me.
Favorite Song: Funeral for a Friend - Elton John
Favorite Movie: Star Wars
Favorite Sport: Baseball
Favorite Season: Summer
Favorite Day of the week: Saturday
Favorite Ice Cream Flavor: Breyers' Brownie Mud Pie
Favorite Time of Day: Evening

9 CURRENTS

Current Mood: Impatient for the end of the work day.
Current Taste: According to Eddie Izzard, Chicken.
Current Clothes: Khakis and a Blue Oxford shirt.
Current Desktop: Factory installed Dell background
Current Toenail Color: Um... flesh colored? One of them is a bit black 'n' blue from kicking my coffee table a few days ago.
Current Time: 2:36 pm
Current Surroundings: My office
Current Thoughts: Can I go HOME yet???

8 FIRSTS

First Best Friend: Michael Barney
First Kiss: Summer
First Screen Name: oharring
First Pet: I guess my folks technically had some fish and dogs when i was really little, but the first one I remember was a cat named Pumpkin.
First Piercing: My foot, on rusty nail.
First Crush: Nicole. And it lasted a long damn time.
First CD: Guns n' Roses - Appetite for Destruction

7 LASTS

Last Cigarette: Never
Last Drink: Screwdriver at bowling league a few weeks ago
Last Car Ride: in to work today
Last Kiss: From S.A. before work this morning. I do my damnedest to get a goodbye kiss every morning.
Last Movie Seen: I watch Grizzly Man on DVD a little bit ago.
Last Phone Call: I called Diego to give him some info about Act and Quickbooks training.
Last CD Played: I was listening to Colin Hay for a few seconds in the car this morning.

6 HAVE YOU EVERS

Have You Ever Dated One Of Your Best Guy/Girl Friends: Many times.
Have You Ever Broken the Law: Yes.
Have You Ever Been Arrested: No.
Have You Ever Skinny Dipped: Yes.
Have You Ever Been on TV: Yes. I was on the Deputy Don show about 20 years ago, and you can hear my voice announcing Barry University volleyball games on a number of telecasts from a few years ago.
Have You Ever Kissed Someone You Didn't Know: Yes. (I suppose it depends on how you mean "know".)

5 THINGS

Thing You're Wearing: My rainbow bracelet.
Thing You've Done Today: Plowed a path to my burning barrel at lunch time.
Thing You Can Hear Right Now: My own gum popping.
Thing You Can't Live Without: West Wing and lists from my wife.
Thing You Do When You're Bored: TiVo

4 PLACES YOU'VE BEEN TODAY

1. Home
2. Work
3. Home again
4. Back to work

3 PEOPLE YOU CAN TELL ANYTHING TO

1. S.A.
2. Kev
3. Drew

2 CHOICES

1. Black or White: Black
2. Hot or Cold: Hot. No question.

1 THING YOU WANT TO DO BEFORE YOU DIE:

Get to a point where I can quit worrying about money. (Unfortunately, I cannot afford a lottery ticket.) ::sigh::

Helllloooooo!!!!!

2006-02-07T12:34:00.000-05:00

Hello faithful readers. Sorry it's been so long since I last checked in, but life's been a bit hectic.

Those of you who also read S.A.'s blog know that we've been getting things set for the baby's arrival in a couple months and that's eaten up a good amount of time. Additionally, due to her posting on Blog for Choice Day, S.A. became a bit of a darling of the Blogosphere and I've spent so much time monitoring the activity along that front that I haven't really had any other time to blog.

Anyway, to be perfectly honest, y'all haven't miseed much. My life has been very busy, but largely uneventful of late.

I hired a new secretary at work, so I guess that's new.

Also, I bowled a 189 last night in our bowling league. This may not seem exciting to most of you, but since I average a 117, it's a pretty significant improvement.

I guess that's about it for now. I'll check back in later.

Laterz

How Roe vs. Wade enabled us to get pregnant

2006-01-22T08:54:00.000-05:00

Today is the 33rd anniversary of the landmark Roe vs. Wade decision.

When Justice Robert Blackmun delivered the opinion of the court, he included the following statement, with which I wholly concur.

"We forthwith acknowledge our awareness of the sensitive and emotional nature of the abortion controversy, of the vigorous opposing views, even among physicians, and of the deep and seemingly absolute convictions that the subject inspires. One's philosophy, one's experiences, one's exposure to the raw edges of human existence, one's religious training, one's attitudes toward life and family and their values, and the moral standards one establishes and seeks to observe, are all likely to influence and to color one's thinking and conclusions about abortion. "

In other words, if you disagree with me, that's okay. I just think you're wrong. Thankfully, the same freedoms that allow women to make decisions about their own body also allow all of us to make decisions about what we believe without fear of repercussion. (At least that's how it's supposed to work.)

Just so y'all understand, I am very definitely "Pro-Choice". I am definitely NOT "Pro-Abortion".

S.A. and I tried to get pregnant for over 3 years. When we found out that we were finally pregnant, it was a huge surprise because we had basically given up hope of ever conceiving. We were operating under the assumption that we were going to have to adopt in order to have children. So needless so say, though we were both strong proponents of the adoption process before that point, we were definitely in favor of it now. But our personal beliefs for how we choose to live our lives are not something that we think has any legal standing.

Both S.A. and I come from big Catholic families, and I would be willing to guess that, were you to interview all the members of our immediate and extended families, you would get the same answers from about 95% of them.

Abortion is wrong. This is true (most of them would say) in much the same way that adultery, murder, and child abuse are wrong. I believe that, for this reason, many of them would tell you that they are "pro-life" and that Roe vs. Wade should be struck down. The only major problem with that line of thinking is this-

You CANNOT legislate morality.

Devout Catholics believe that it is WRONG to eat meat on a Friday. Muslims believe it's WRONG to eat pork. According to my old CCD classes (Catholic Sunday School, for all you non-Catholic out there,) the thought is the same as the deed so it is WRONG to "lust" after the hottie who sits 3 rows over from you in your biology class. And simply thinking about how nice it would be to pull out a rocket launcher and blow the SUV in front of you (who is driving 15 miles under the speed limit and has had his turn signal on for 7 miles) off the road is WRONG. It's the same as actually doing it in "God's Eyes".

But no-one would ever suggest that we make laws against all these things. Why? Because you CANNOT LEGISLATE MORALITY. This is THE basic concept upon which this country was founded.

Now I believe that you would be very hard-pressed to find someone who thought that abortion was something they hoped to go through at some point in their life. And to anyone who suggests that folks who have an abortion rather than the alternatives (keeping the baby, offering it up for abortion) , I offer up the following opinion.

You, sir/ma'am, are an idiot.

I'm not going to go into all the research that's been done about the lifelong mental and emotional effects of having an abortion (Do a google search. They're not hard to find. Also, S.A. wrote a much longer and, in all honesty, better blog about this stuff today.) but the decision to have, and the results of having, an abortion are not EASY in any way, shape, or form.

I'll probably try to post a bit more information here later today, but I'll offer up this last bit of personal information before I need to leave for church. (I know, shocking. The pro-choice heathen goes to church.)

When S.A. and I were basically given one last chance to conceive a baby, we were told that because of the nature of the medical treatment we were undergoing, the odds of having "high-level multiples" (e.g. 3 or more babies) were extremely high. Because of this, we were commanded by our doctor to come to a decision relating to our feelings about "selective reduction". In other words, because of the health risks involved in any multiple pregnancy and birth, would we be willing/able to choose to abort some of the fetuses if we found out there were 3 or 4 or 5 or more?

Obviously the specifics of our decision are a pretty personal thing so I won't give you all the details, but in short form, the answer was YES.

Because of the especially high risks to S.A. (We're considered a "high-risk" pregnancy.) carrying an especially high number of multiples (quints, sextuplets) would be EXTREMELY dangerous to both her and to the babies. Because of this, had selective reduction not been an option, (which it WILL NOT BE if our current political administration gets its way,) we would not have been able to have children of our own, because, as much as I want children, I was CATEGORICALLY unwilling to risk S.A.'s health and, more importantly, life.

Thankfully, when we finally got pregnant, it was with just one baby. He's due on April 16th. And I cannot begin to express how glad I am that I was not forced with making a choice between not even trying to conceive a baby and risking the life of the most important person in my life.

The opposite of "Pro-Life" is NOT "Pro-Choice". It's "Pro-Death". I'm immensely thankful that the laws in this country are such that people like S.A. and I actually had a choice. That, among many other reasons, is why I'm Pro-Choice.

Laterz

D'oh!

2006-01-17T14:11:00.000-05:00

I have to hire a secretary. I really need one because I am not, well... Let's say I'm kind of a big-picture guy. I'm not so great with the details. In other words, I keep needing to use overnight shipping to get textbooks, because I forget to order them in a timely manner and all the plants in my office are dying.

I've been interviewing candidates for the past few days and I've got some decent candidates, but I just haven't found the right one. Today I decided that I going to request a little bit of extra testing from all my finalists. I wanted to have them basically write me a small press release and make me a small flier, just to let me get a little better idea of their work.

When I took my bright ideas to the owner of my company (my immediate supervisor is out of the office today and I know that the owner really likes me) to get approval for my ideas before I implemented them, he immediately signed off on them. He then asked me, "Having a tough time finding a decent candidate, huh?"

I defense of all the folks I've interviewed I responded that all of the candidates would truly be okay, I just really wanted to find the right person.

He gave me a quizzical look which conveyed to me that perhaps I was taking this interview process a bit too seriously and replied, "Let's not spend TOO much time worrying about this, okay. It's just a secretary."

Evidently, though my seriousness during this whole process has impressed the whole female staff at my agency, I have succeeded in losing all my built up "Guy Points" I'd earned by being the only other male in the building besides the owner.

Crap. I guess I should have used the "Who Looks Best in a Mini-Skirt While Being Chased Around a Desk" hiring criterion.

Laterz

Misc. News and Notes

2006-01-16T08:19:00.000-05:00

No particularly exciting happenings on the home front this weekend.

S.A. and I decided on a color for the walls in the nursery. We also decided that the dresser that I am currently using will be moving into the nursery, once it's re-painted. That's kind of fun. It was originally my Grandpa's, so it'll be on to generation number 4. I suspect that Beav would be happy, as he was a very proud student of the "Never Throw Anything Out, EVER" school.

Last night, we went to dinner at La Senorita (Come taste the flavor of fun!) with Kev, Liam, Liam's sister April, and her friend Ruth. All good folks, and a good time was, indeed, had by all. We than went back to the house and played "Apples to Apples" and "Imagine if..."(This is, in fact, a misspelling, but I do not care.)

It's awfully nice to have a few close friends around. Though I wish I wasn't constantly worried about money, I definitely must say that my life right now is fast-approaching my first few years of college as the most satisfying time of my life.

I hope all of you, dear readers, can say the same.

Laterz.

More "Proof Readers Wanted" ads

2006-01-13T10:03:00.000-05:00

I got an email this morning from the boss of the person who sent me the "Hostility Training" email. She had received a copy of my responding email.

Dear Mr. Harrington,
I wanted to take a moment to thank you for the email you sent yesterday regarding our Hospitality and Tourism Seminar. We have currently sent out over 200 copies of the email that you received and plan to send out at least 400 more. Your response was the only one we received pointing out that we were actually offering "Hostility Training".
We truly appreciated you input and we also appreciated the fact that you used humor to get your point across.
Thank you again. We look forward to continuing to do business with you in the future.

A**** T*******

Cripe. I believe this means that most people in the country are really dumb. (Otherwise, SOMEBODY would have mentioned this besides me.) Also, it certainly establishes that the meanings we take from things are inferred; they are not necessarily implied. I certainly thought my email was funny. I'm a little surprised that they did.

*****************************************************************

1 small note for all those people in the world who look for things to make them feel good about humanity.

In 1929, 25 years after J.M. Barrie published Peter Pan, he gave the copyright of his children's classic to Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children. This means that every time it's made into a movie or used as the basis for another book (Hook by Terry Brooks, Capt. Hook : The Adventures of a Notorious Youth by J. V. Hart and Brett Helquist, and Peter and the Starcatchers by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson, among many others), the Children's Hospital receives the author's royalties.

I just thought that this was really cool and worth mentioning. Also, I can personally vouch for the 3 aforementioned books, so perhaps you should all go buy them and both get to read a few good books, but also get to feel that you're giving to a worthy cause.

Just a thought.

Laterz

Reasons why proof-readers are important

2006-01-12T11:52:00.000-05:00

The following is an email I received from a major corporate training agency today. I do a good amount of business with this company, becuase they have developed a very good training curriculum. That being said, today was definitely not one of their shining moments.

Hello There,

I am sorry I missed you. I wanted to tell you about our hostility and tourism program. The program is being launch on January 15. Also we have our train to trainer seminar on February 27, 2006. This seminar will be located in sunny Florida.

I did let you know that at least once a month I would contact you, so that the communication lines will always be open. If you have any questions feel free to contact me at my office. I have been assigned to your region to help you with any and everything, from marketing to ordering exams. So please exhaust your resources.

Thank you and I look forward to speaking with you.

Your Partner,

J****** M******

I responded with the following email.

Johnnel-
Thank you for your email. I appreciate your contacting me and keeping me informed. Email is often the best way to accomplish this as I am generally away from my phone.
One note- While I can see that Hospitality and Tourism training could be very useful, I suspect that "Hostility" and Tourism training will find a much smaller market. I know that I, for one, am already very good at directing hostility towards tourists. Check the email you sent me. I hope it wasn't a form letter you sent out to many people.

Thank you again for keeping me informed.

Owen Harrington

Notice that I was nice enough not to mention that the program was "being launch" on January 15. Nor did I mention that a "train to trainer" seminar sounds potentially painful. (A TRAINER to trainer seminar might be better.) And I even kept it to myself that, in the phrase "any and everything", the any should be hyphenated.

This is why I'm having a difficult time hiring a secretary. If I hire someone who writes like this, I'm just gonna have to fire them.

Laterz.

Applebuns. Crusty Applebuns.

2006-01-11T12:54:00.000-05:00

The following in an excerpt from the children's book, "Captain Underpants and the Perilous Plot of Professor Poopypants" by Dave Pilkey. In the book the evil professor forces everyone to assume new names.

Use the third letter of your first name to determine your new first name:

a = poopsie
b = lumpy
c = buttercup
d = gidget
e = crusty
f = greasy
g = fluffy
h = cheeseball
i = chim-chim
j = stinky
k = flunky
l = boobie
m = pinky
n = zippy
o = goober
p = doofus
q = slimy
r = loopy
s = snotty
t = tootie
u = dorkey
v = squeezit
w = oprah
x = skipper
y = dinky
z = zsa-zsa

Use the second letter of your last name to determine the first half of your new last name:

a = apple
b = toilet
c = giggle
d = burger
e = girdle
f = barf
g = lizard
h = waffle
i = cootie
j = monkey
k = potty
l = liver
m = banana
n = rhino
o = bubble
p = hamster
q = toad
r = gizzard
s = pizza
t = gerbil
u = chicken
v = pickle
w = chuckle
x = tofu
y = gorilla
z = stinker

Use the fourth letter of your last name to determine the second half of your new last name:

a = head
b = mouth
c = face
d = nose
e = tush
f = breath
g = pants
h = shorts
i = lips
j = honker
k = butt
l = brain
m = tushie
n = chunks
o = hiney
p = biscuits
q = toes
r = buns
s = fanny
t = sniffer
u = sprinkles
v = kisser
w = squirt
x = humperdinck
y = brains
z = juice

Post your new name in the comments!

Going' for a Threebie.

2006-01-11T12:42:00.000-05:00

Beacause I'm really trying to get back on track with this whole blogging thing, I have a third entry for today.

Would you rather:

wear underwear made out of fur OR bubblegum? Is the gum chewed?
have a complete stranger walk up and french kiss you OR get licked on your naked butt by a strange dog? Assuming we're just talking about a cheek, I'll opt for the dog licking my ass. The stranger thing would be okay if everyone looked like Natalie Portman, but it's been my observation that much of world looks alot like Louie Anderson.
put curry on everything you eat OR touch everything to your chin before putting it in your mouth? I'm opting for the curry. I don't even like food to touch my lips, much less my chin.
make a funny face and have it stay that way OR lie and have your pants light on fire? Definitely the pants on fire. If that happened, I suspect most people would even mind my lying.

Ouch...

2006-01-11T12:21:00.000-05:00

S.A. says I have to be more diligent about posting to my blog. However, she says it's okay for my posts not to be at all timely or related to anything in my life at the moment. She actually suggested I post this one.

I swear that this is a true story, though I'm sure many of you are going to say I'm repeating a joke or something.

A close friend of my dad's (a retired teacher from my old high school) has a twin brother who lives in the Detroit area. Years ago, his brother was sent to the store by his wife, who was sick in bed with the flu.

She gave him a short list of items to pick up. Most of the items were no big deal, but he was somewhat dismayed to find that he was supposed to pick up a box of feminine hygiene products. Being a dutiful husband, he went the the feminine hygiene section and looked for the exact product she had requested. After a bit of searching he found the right box.

He went up to the check-out line and set all his items on the belt. One-by-one, the clerk rang up the items until she came to the box of feminine products. She began turning the box end-over-end in her hands, apparently looking for a price tag.

When he realized that she didn't seem to be finding one, he quickly offered to run back to the shelf and see if there was a price tag there. Unfortunately, before he could go look, she turned to the microphone next to her register.

"Bob, can I have a price check on Tampax?" she broadcast over the crackly store p.a. system.

As customers in neighboring checkout lines turned to look at the now-mortified shopper, a little old man (apparently Bob) yelled from the back of the store, "Do you mean the ones you push in with your thumb or the kind you drive in with a hammer???"

Evidently, he thought she'd asked about tacks.

Again, I swear that this is a true story. Mr. V. (the teacher) even submitted it to Reader's Digest in the early 80's.

Positive Affirmations for Childbirth (From a Guy's Point of View)

2006-01-11T11:51:00.001-05:00

At Lamaze class last night, S.A. and I were given a sheet of paper labeled "Positive Affirmations for Childbirth". It's a list of things that we should say aloud to ourselves or write down repeatedly throughout the week. Evidently, if we say enough good things to ourselves during the days and weeks that lead up to the birth, we won't worry so much when the slimy lizard pops out from between her legs. I think that for anyone who is considering attending a Lamaze class in the future, it might be important for you to understand what you're in for.

Affirmations for the Man/Partner

I see my wife as a strong and capable woman, and this does not threaten me. (This may not threaten me, but I guarantee that if S.A. hears me spouting this drivel when she's in the hospital, she's definitely gonna threaten me.)
Childbirth is a safe and natural process. (Safe for who? It may be natural, but anything that involves screaming, blood, and what is apparently a mucus-covered reptile coming out of my wife's private region, can hardly be described as being exactly safe. And the fact that she's made it very clear that she doesn't care if I pass out and crack my head open on the floor in the delivery room, but I am damn well gonna be with her in the delivery room even though I really hate both needles and blood implies to me that the process may not be entirely safe for me either.)
I am supporting my wife during her labor, even when she is in pain. (I'm assuming they don't mean this in a literal sense. She's planning on being largely numb through the process and I am certainly not planning to hold her up through the whole process. Especially since both our mom's were in labor for 24 hours+ when in labor with us.)
It is OK for my wife to have pain during childbirth. I know the pain is temporary, and can't harm her. (Again, can't harm her??? Episiotomy, anyone?)
I am expressing my love to my wife easily and frequently. (Frequently, yes. As she gets crankier and clutzier, easily may be an overstatement.)
I am accepting the labor that is meant for us. (What's this us stuff??? I'm not going into labor. And who exactly meant it for us? If God intended for people to suffer through "natural childbirth" he wouldn't have invented epidurals.)
I am accepting feelings of helplessness, and I know that these feelings are normal. (I'm confused. How am I helpless? Do I need help? Should I be more helpful? I'm pretty sure I'm not allowed to do any of the pushing.)
I am feeling the love others have for me when I need support. (This is complete crap. People do not give a shit when I need support. When we have company to the house now, they don't even bother to say hello to me. The general order of events is- Ask how "Mama" is doing; rub her stomach; go look at the nursery. People are not concerned about dad needing any support.)
I am sensitive, tender, open, and trusting. (I'm not really known for being sensitive or tender; I tend to be a little too open; and, as they say on the X-Files, "Trust no-one.")

2005 in Review

2005-12-29T13:49:00.000-05:00

What did you do in 2005 that you'd never done before? I made a baby.
Did you keep your new year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I’ve never made a New Year’s Resolution. I’m gonna this year, though.
Did anyone close to you give birth? Two of my wife’s cousins had their first babies. We’re up next.
Did anyone close to you die? No.
What countries did you visit? None.
What would you like to have in 2006 that you lacked in 2005? I’m gonna have a baby boy.
What dates from 2005 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? Friday, August 5th. That’s the day we found out we were pregnant.
What was your biggest achievement of the year? I got hired and promoted twice in a 6-month span.
What was your biggest failure? I live the same failure every day. I will never be able to live up to the example set forth for me by my grandpa.
Did you suffer illness or injury? Healthy as a horse.
What was the best thing you bought? Fertility shots.
Whose behavior merited celebration? My mother-in-law. At some point this year, she finally crossed over into the light and declared (at least to my wife and I) that’s she’s no longer a Republican and she agrees that President Bush IS evil.
Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? Dubya’s
Where did most of your money go? I’m not sure. It sure did disappear fast, though.
What did you get really, really, really excited about? Sam
What song will always remind you of 2005? Beautiful Boy
Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder? WAY Happier b) thinner or fatter? Fatter c) richer or poorer? About the same, but looking up.
What do you wish you'd done more of? I wish I'd spent more time with the gang.
What do you wish you'd done less of? Procrastinating
How did you spend Christmas? Christmas Eve was with my family – S.A., Mom, Pop, Frog, Aunt Marie, Uncle Joe & Aunt Beck, Jake, & Sara. Christmas Day was with S.A.’s clan. Sylv & Danno, Rach &amp; Jeff, Matt & Joe, Amy, Joe & the girls, the Scotts, more Hamps, assorted grandparents, etc.
Did you fall in love in 2005? Every day, over and over again
How many one-night stands? None
What was your favorite TV program? House or West Wing
Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year? No.
What was the best book you read? S.A. formatted and put every installation of NPR’s This I Believe series in a binder of me for Christmas. I read it, with tears streaming down my face, for hours.
What was your greatest musical discovery? More of a re-deiscovery really. Hooked on Classics. This time on CD.
What did you want and get? A good job and a pregnant wife.
What did you want and not get? A jeep.
What was your favorite film of this year? I think I went to fewer movies this year than any year since I got my driver’s license.
What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? I don’t think I really did much. I turned 27.
What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? Finshing up the mortgage process.
How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2005? “Sweetie? What should I wear???”
What kept you sane? Who says I’m sane?
Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Can’t really think of anybody offhand.
What political issue stirred you the most? Iraq.
Who did you miss? Drew, Shawna, Steve, Michelle, Jen, Kerry, Carol, & PJ
Who was the best new person you met? I don’t really think I met anyone new this year, but I’m closer than before with a number of people.
Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2005: Stuff works out.
Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:

"If not for you
My sky would fall,
Rain would gather too.
Without your love I'd be nowhere at all,
I'd be lost if not for you."
-George Harrison
“If Not for You”

Computers can do anything... including berate morons.

2005-12-29T10:07:00.000-05:00

My company provides technical support to a local non-profit agency. Specifically, my predecessor designed a pair of MAMMOTH databases in Microsoft Access for them to track all of their operations. The databases are absolutely gigundo, so they require a certain amount of periodic maintenance.

The administrator in change of overseeing the database is basically computer illiterate. This would not be nearly as frustrating if it was not obvious that this was practiced illiteracy, cultivated for the sole purpose of providing an excuse for making ridiculous requests of the people who work on the database, namely me.

My predecessor used to get extremely frustrated because whenever she told the administrator that it was not possible to she what she wanted with their current computer setup, the administrator unfailingly responded with, "Yvonne, computers can do ANYTHING. You just have to tell them."

Yvonne, not being a confrontational person, would just bite her tongue and live with it. Or so I thought before today.

I was called to that office this morning because the administrator had managed to blow up the database. This wasn't a hug crisis, as far as I was concerned, because the database is backed up every day, so even in a worst case scenario, we could always pull the previous version off the backup tape and we'd be fine. However, it appeared to me once I looked at her machine that the problem she was encountering may be due to some sort of corruption of the macros, the small sub-programs that Yvonne had written into the original database. I decided to take a look at them and see if there was anything obvious that I could fix. What I found nearly sent me into convultions from laughing.

My former boss, always polite and well-mannered, had written custom error messages into the macros that would only show up when the administrator did something particularly hair-brained. Messages like "Wrong Button, Dummy" and "That's not the right way to do it. Duh!" were sprinkled throughout the macros. Great stuff.

I have a whole new level of respect for Yvonne, now.

Laterz.

Christmas Thank Yous

2005-12-27T09:32:00.000-05:00

First things first-

I, again, must apologize for not writing as often as I ought. I realize that there are a certain group of folks who look forward to reading my blog and, though I question their rather alarming lack of taste in reading material, I still feel an obligation to update most often than I have the past while. Mea culpa.

I also have 1 request to send out.

Laura- If you’re reading this, could you grab my black leather jacket from your Grandpa’s front room if you visit him this week? I left it there when S.A. and I left and I can get it when I see you this weekend. Thanks a ton. (No obligation, I just thought you might be around there during the week.)

That said, today’s blog is pretty much a long thank you letter. It is, by and large, more serious than most of my blogs, so you’ll have to forgive me. If you’re looking for comedy, you should probably check back in tomorrow. I promise I’ll try to get back to normal.

An extended and repeated Merry Christmas, Happy Chanuka, etc. to all the Poker Gang. Y’all are the biggest reason that Michigan again feels like home to me for the first time in 10 years.

Liam- I’m happy to play surrogate dad when the situation dictates. Make sure your family knows, if they start to tease you that your friends feel a need to play that role, that I hope that my son turns out very much like you in many respects.

Johnny & Adrian- I’m proud of you both. It’s not easy being the adults in a house full of really big kids.

Skippy – You’re smarter than you let on. Don’t treat that like something about which you should be embarrassed. Keep following your musical dream. You’ve already shown more balls on that front than I was ever able to and I still regret that on a regular basis. DO NOT let day-to-day living take away from that. Corporate America will suck out your soul if you let it.

Paul, Trav, Susanna, etc. – We love you all.

Merry Christmas and a large Thank You to Kev. It’s kind of fun to be pushing 30 and to again have a “best friend”. Remember that, for all the jokes we make about your being a geeky, selfish bastard, you have an awful lot to offer. There are very few intelligent, polite, selfless people in the world. That should be a source of confidence for you, not of embarrassment.

To the Tropic Cove Bowling Team – Thanks guys. This is the most fun I’ve even had with a team in any sport that I wasn’t coaching.

Frog – You’re good people. You still irritate the piss out of me from time to time, but I can’t wait to watch what a great aunt you’ll be. Remember when I say I think you’re gonna be Aunt Ev that Aunt Ev was ALWAYS my favorite Aunt. I HOPE the Sam thinks you’re just like her.

Mom & Pop- Thanks for everything this Christmas. Sorry we couldn't go to Church with you, but I think that the extra family time is way more valuable than church anway. As always you spent way too much money on us, but we certainly appreciate it.

Danno & Sylv- I am incredibly blessed to have 2 sets of parents. Thank you for everything.

Jeff & Matt - I now know what it would be like to have brothers. Thanks guys.

Rachel - You've always been Sarah's best friend. Strangely, I'm starting to feel like you one of mine, too. Thanks.

Joe- When that RoboSapiens learns to play baseball, let me know. Aunt Sarah & I both love you.

To the entire Hamp Clan- Thanks for making me part of your family even when I know there are certainly times you'd probably like to deposit me in the nearest snowbank.

Hello, Merry Christmas, and we miss you to the whole Barry Gang. Shawna, Michelle, Jen, Drew, Stev, Kerry, Dr. M, P.J., & J.K. We're stuck here in Michigan without a huge chuck of our family. Hopefully you all can make it to Michigan sometime this year once Sam's born.

And last, but certainly not least-

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and I Love You to S.A. You're my whole world, at least for the next 3 months or so.

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, etc. to everyone. I hope next year is as happy and fulfulling for all of you as this one has been for us.

Laterz

Whoohoo! 2 Days in a Row!

2005-12-08T11:06:00.000-05:00

Interesting fact that may interest only me- Andrew Andrew pointed out that if my wife has any monogrammed stuff, she can soon give it to our son. He'll think it's just got his name on it.

Anyway, I stole a meme from Andrew Andrew. I do that quite often. Lucky you.

Name? Spike

Birthday? April 2nd. Obviously a day late.

Current location? In my office at work. Where else would I blog?

Eye Color? Blue

Hair Color? Hair? I don't need no steenkeen hair!

Height? 6 feet, 1 and 5/8 inches

Right Handed or Left Handed? Right

Your heritage? Mostly French on one side and North Irish on the other

The shoes you wore today? Scuffed up Payless "dress shoes"

Your weakness? I am indestructable. (Unless a somewhat oversized ego could somehow be interpreted as a weakness.)

Your fears? Too many to count.

Your perfect pizza? Ham & Pineapple

Goal you would like to achieve in 2006? Actually turn a profit in my golf shop.

Your most overused phrase on an instant messenger? Gotcha

First thoughts upon waking up today? Sweet. S.A.'s waking me up so I don't have to hear my g*dd*mn alarm.

Your best physical feature? My height

Your bedtime? No less than 45 minutes after S.A. goes to bed. Generally around 10:30

Your most missed memory? I miss college. It may sound cliche, but thems were some good times.

Pepsi or Coke? DIET Coke

McDonalds or Burger King? I am NOT a fast food guy. Doesn't matter what I eat. It all makes me sick.

Single or Group Dates? Single. S.A.'s not into the groups thing. ::nudge, nudge::

Lipton Ice Tea or Nestea? Lipton. (In a 20 oz bottle)

Chocolate or Vanilla? Chocolate

Cappuccino or Coffee? Prolly Cappuccino, but I'm okay with either.

Do you smoke? Hell no.

Do you swear? I'm doing my best to quit. I don't want my son to sound like me.

Do you sing? Every day. I used to sing in a band, but my stage fright was so bad I had to sing the first song with my back to the audience.

Do you shower daily? Yup.

Have you been in love? I am truly, deeply, rediculously in love. Thankfully, she's willing to put up with me, too. I suspect that may have something to do with my being the one who plows the driveway.

Do you want to go to college? Yup. I'm going be a pre-school teacher some day. At my current rate of study, that day will be in about 60 years.

Do you want to get married? Again? I don't think polygamy is for me.

Do you believe in yourself? I'm a mental mess. I have unreasonable confidence most of the time, but lately I spend way to much time worrying about screwing up the lives of everyone around me. (This whole having a kid thing is mentally kicking my ass.)

Do you get motion sickness? Only if the moving thing is a crowded elevator.

Do you think you are attractive? I know I'd do me.

Are you a health freak? Nope. I'm very health conscious, but way too lazy to really do it right.

Do you get along with your parents? Very well. (In-laws, too.)

Do you like thunderstorms? Love 'em.

Do you play an instrument? Piano and harmonica.

In the past month have you drank alcohol? Yes. I had a Woodchuck's at my sister's over Thanksgiving.

In the past month have you smoked? No

In the past month have you been on drugs? Lots of 'em. (ADD meds, antidepressants, allergy meds, etc.)

In the past month have you gone on a date? Nope. But I sit on the floor in front of my wife and talk to her belly as we watch TV most nights. That's waaaayyyy better.

In the past month have you gone to a mall? Yes. Also over Thanksgiving. I frickin' HATE the mall. And I REALLY HATE jewelry store clerks. I need a shirt that says "I'M JUST LOOKING! F**K OFF!"

In the past month have you eaten a box of Oreos? No. I don't like Oreos.

In the past month have you eaten sushi? HELL NO.

In the past month have you been on stage? Nope

In the past month have you been dumped? No

In the past month have you gone skinny dipping? I haven't been skinny dipping since I got married.

In the past month have you stolen anything? Nope.

Ever been drunk? Uh. YEAH. (I do have a college degree.)

Ever been called a tease? Yup.

Ever been beaten up? No

Ever shoplifted? Long long ago. I shoplifted baseball cards in junior high. My Dad made me take 'em back in.

How do you want to die? When I was in 3rd grade, Mike Barney and I decided that we wanted to fall into a spring-loaded trash compactor covered in spikes. I'm not into slow deaths, but I'm all about gore.

What do you want to be when you grow up? I'm not gonna grow up. I wouldn't say I'm Peter Pan, but, come to thing of it, I do seem to have my own band of Lost Boys.

What country would you most like to visit? The UK. Lots of golf and everybody speaks English.

Reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.

2005-12-07T09:59:00.000-05:00

Sorry, Gang.

I just wanted to let y'all know that I am not, in fact, dead.

I know I've been shitty about updating this thing but life has been slightly insane lately.

A brief rundown of reasons for not writing-

1. I've been promoted to Director of my division at work. This may not seem like a hardship, but it's been rough. I was hired as a part-time tech trainer about 6 months ago. I was then promoted to office manager, but they didn't hire a new tech trainer so I was doing 2 jobs. Now I've been promoted to Director but we still haven't hired anyone new so I'm now doing 3 jobs and I'm going rapidly insane.

2. We're pregnant and we just found out it's a boy. Again, this is in no way a hardship, but it's taking a great deal of my mental faculties to deal with all the associated stuff on a day-to-day basis.

3. I'm a lazy bastard.

Anyway, I PROMISE I'll try to do better from now on. And on that note...

I HATE WINTER!!!!!!!

I cannot state this strongly enough. I know, you're saying, "Why the **** do you live in Michigan, then, dumbass???"

But I agreed to move back to MI (where I grew up) from Miami (where I went to college) when I got engaged. S.A. is also from Michigan and she stated, quite emphatically, that she was NOT going to live and have children in Miami. So we moved. However, days like the past couple
give me serious doubts about the wisdom of that decision.

I assume that, if you're a regular reader of S.A.'s blog, you've read a nice romantic view of the beauty of Northern Michigan under a layer of new-fallen snow. (I assume, because I haven't had time to read her blog lately.) I, on the other hand, will give you a more realistic view of things.

S.A. and I went to leave for work yesterday morning and found that, due to the 15" of snow we'd received overnight, there was absolutely no way we were going to be able to get our cars out of the driveway. I called my uncle, who lives a couple blocks away, and asked him if he could drive S.A. to work so she wouldn't be too late. He happily did so. And I went about trying to shove my driveway so I could leave.

All my life, I assumed that a paved driveway would be easier to keep clean during the winter. This is, of course, because I grew up with a long gravel driveway. The grass is always greener and all that jazz. I may have been correct. However, I did not take into account, when we moved into our house, that a paved driveway that goes dramatically uphill as it leads to the road is swiftly converted to an ice rink, from which no 2-wheel-drive car can escape, unless you are extremely diligent about plowing and salting. I'm not diligent.

More to the point, I didn't own a snow blower and the driveway is rather long, so shoveling over a foot of snow from it before work in the morning is a difficult proposition. However, as there did not seem to be any other option, I went to it.

I shoveled for about 20 minutes before I heard the sound of a tractor starting in my neighbor’s barn. I turned around and out he came, riding his John Deere. He buzzed up and down the driveway (Okay, maybe rumbled is a better term.) and signaled to me that the driveway was clear and I could now leave.

In reality, the only CLEAR part of the driveway was the layer of ice covering the pavement. I barely touch the gas and my wheels began to spin. Needless to say, I was still going nowhere. Obviously feeling pity for me, he backed his tractor up to my rear bumper, pushing the rear blade right up against my car are proceeded to push me up my driveway. Had I any pride at all, it might have been somewhat embarrassing.

By the afternoon, I had arranged to purchase a new snow blower. Unfortunately, snow blowers do not fit in the trunk of a '98 Nissan Sentra, so I also had to find someone with a vehicle to help me bring my new beast home. Since I was having significant difficulty finding anyone available before 5pm, when the store closed, I decided to attempt to use my uncle's 2-wheel-drive pickup. All of you who have tried to drive a 2-wheel-drive up a steep, extremely icy hill say it with me now.

Bloody moron.

I succeeded in fishtailing the truck ridiculously close to the front door of my house and only stopped when I realized that 6 more inches and I going to be parked in our entryway. I then called my dad and begged him to stop what he was doing and help me pick up my snow blower and move the truck back where it belonged. Thankfully, he complied.

I finished blowing the driveway at about 8pm. But not until I'd gotten another of our cars stuck and un-stuck.

I HATE winter.

Laterz

FUMMMMMBBBBBLLLLLE!!!!!

2005-11-15T12:17:00.000-05:00

It turns out there's a reason that regulation NFL footballs aren't grown in gardens.

Our friend Tim came over to play poker a few months ago. He brought us a melon. We didn't really know what kind of melon it was and Tim didn't say, but we gratefully accepted it, because Tim's our only friend who does those things and we try to set a good example for the rest of the kids who play poker with us.

The melon, however, was very dark green with orange spots on it. S.A. and I guessed it was probably something similar to a cantaloupe or a muskmelon, must it really was just a guess. Because neither of us likes any kind of melon except for watermelon, we decided we would hold on to it until we had a chance to give it to my mom, who loves melon of every sort.

So it sat on our counter for a couple months.

Somewhat amazingly, it didn't start to visibly rot in all that time. However, this weekend, when I woke up at 4:30am on Sunday with an urge to do some major house-cleaning (It's a sickness that runs in my family. Don't ask.), I decided that I would run it out to the field behind our house and drop it out there. I figured some hungry deer might eat it.

Now, for those of you who don't know me well, I'm a sort of high-energy guy. I don't normally walk places, and when I have work to do, I try to turn it into some sort of game or contest with myself in order to make the time pass more quickly and make the task more enjoyable.

Since I also had a spaghetti squash that needed to be tossed, I carried both items onto my back porch, wearing my slippers and pjs. It's about 50 yards from my back porch to the beginning of the field/swamp that's out behind the house. Tossing the squash up in the air and catching it, I decided that I could easily toss it from the porch into the field, thereby creating a fun game for myself (How far can I throw a squash?) and also removing the necessity to actually go out into by back yard in the 50mph+ wind gusts that wracked Northern Michigan on Sunday. However, having a very good knowledge of sports medicine and physiology, I knew that throwing it overhand without warming up first would probably result in some sort of injury and may even necessitate of the removal of an arm. (I'm REALLY out of shape.) Therefore, I threw it discus-style.

The throw was a success, landing 10 yards or so into the long grass, but I realized that, considering how much heavier the melon was, I might very well be unsuccessful in throwing it all the way out there. I also have some experience with what happens with melons dropped from a considerable height, so I knew I really didn't want this thing exploding all over my back yard. I've been trying to clean the yard up for winter and I knew that an exploding melon can create quite a mess.

So I decided I was gonna have to carry it out there.

My drive for fun still soundly in place, I decided to tuck the melon under my arm, running-back-style, and dodge imaginary defenders on my way through the back yard.

The first couple defenders missed me as I executed a perfect spin move around a wooden bench. I sped by another defender running straight down the field and then realized I had only one defender left to beat. With a huge gust of wind blowing me to the left, I went left, planted my slippered foot, and threw my shoulders back to the right. My upper body shot to the right...

And my feet flew out of my slippers and went left.

I went down hard, protecting the melon with both arms in front of me, as any good halfback would. It turns out there's a good reason that they don't run football practice with melons.

Considering that me primary for carrying the melon through the yard in the first place was to avoid a mess, I really had to consider my plan a failure. Landing on what turns out to be a very nice watermelon (D'oh!) resulted in my having watermelon goop all over my pj pants and t-shirt as well as in my mouth, ears, and hair. It also led to my being concerned that I may have cracked a rib on the doggone melon, as it hurt quite a bit to take a breath.

It turns out that I'm fine. No harm done. Well, excluding the melon.

-----------------------------------

1 other short note.

S.A. and I were chatting about being pregnant last night. I make a comment about "by boys" getting the job done.

She replied that it would have been nice if they'd gotten it done a bit more quickly, so we hadn't stressed for YEARS.

I replied that she should have expected that. There are MY sperm, after all, and I never do anything the first few times she asks me.

She should have given them a damn list.

I'm guessing she could have thought of a good place to put it.

Laterz.

MacDanno

2005-11-10T12:48:00.000-05:00

I've recently discovered another major difference between men and women. Appreciation of ingenuity.

Examples-

My father-in-law is a neat guy. He's a blacksmith and a wood-worker and is always making all sorts of neat stuff. However, a couple weeks ago, he outdid himself.

We were up at S.A.'s family cabin and one of the Jeeps had a flat tire. As any logical person would do, Danno went to get his air compressor. This occasion was unique, however, because Danno's air compressor is HOME-MADE. He had taken an old propane tank and attached it to an old electric motor and a 50-year-old compressor turbine thingy ("Where does one get a 'compressor turbine thingy'?", you ask. Behind the shed, of course. Duh.) and attached them all to a wooden plank on wheels (for ease in moving). And, voila! A home-made air compressor.

Needless to say, we boys gathered around this magnificent beast expressing our awe at the skill and mental resources that one must posess in order to create such a spectactular example of human inginuity. (And, of course, taking pictures.) Danno was like MacGuyver in Santa's body.

The girls, on the other hand, stood around making jokes about "Daddy's pet compressor" and generally acting embarrassed as he pulled the compressor down the driveway by an attached string.

We boys discussed their indefensible behavior and hoped that it was a one-time occurence. Going unsaid was the common belief that this was not, in all probability, the case.

A few days later, I personally became the victim of this rediculous femine bias against ingenuity.

My wife, who is now about 4 1/2 months pregant, mentioned to me that it was almost time that the baby could begin to hear the sounds of the outside world. S.A. and I have discussed at some length the value in exposing an unborn baby to music while still inthe womb. I've even burned a couple cds specifically for that purpose.

Therefore, I went to get headphones to put on her stomach. Unfortunately, S.A. really hasn't gained any weight yet and, therefore, does not have enough of a tummy to attach the headphones to. However, since my headphone swivel, I figured I could just put them in a flattened position and attach them to her middle.

I ran to my closet and get a belt. I ran the belt through the headphones and ran back to Sarah to strap the headphones on her.

Inexplicably, she pushed me away. My wife, one of the smartest people I know, and also a person who agress with me about the importance of music early in development, would not allow me to strap the headphones around her middle because it looked silly. Now, we were alone in our bedroom. The only person who would see it would be me, and, to be honest, I've already seen her in a compromising position or two. (Remember, I've been present for a number of trans-vaginal ultrasounds.) Even the baby can't see the setup. He/she would only reap the rewards thereof.

But no. S.A. made it very clear to me that she WOULD NOT be wearing the headphones held on by a belt. If I wanted our unborn child to be able to listen to music, I was damn well gonna have to hold the headphones in place myself.

All this drama was over the fact that my setup looked a little bit unique. The brilliance of the invention, that it could be worn around the house or in bed without being concerned that they'd fall off, was completely lost to her.

Sheer silliness.

I'd love to believe that this disregard for ingenuity is unique in women sharing S.A.'s genetic makeup, but somehow I doubt it. It's a little bit depressing.

Laterz

Blog suggestion

2005-11-08T11:17:00.000-05:00

I'm sitting her killing time and so I have just looked at technorati.com for ideas about other folks blogs that I might enjoy reading. Being a gigantic geek, I searcedh for Star Wars themed blogs. They gave me TONS of options when I used Vader and Chewbacca as search terms. Wonder of wonders, I actually found a good, funny, well-written blog. So, since I personally find that decent blogs are almost impossible to come by, here's a plug for it. Check it out.

Helldorado

How can you tell if a fish is drooling?

2005-10-28T14:50:00.000-04:00

I'm sick.

I have a cold. And, as anyone who knows me can tell you, I don't often get sick, and therefore am not very good at it. I'm honestly a great big weenie. I moan and whine and am generally miserable. Also, I don't think very well. I assume that this is due to snot building up in the synapses in my brain.

Last night I walked to the dresser to grab my pill bottle and take take my night-time meds. Due to my compromised mental state, I accidentally picked up the fish food and, without noticing, unscrewed the cap and poured it into my hand, just as I would a pill. Thankfully, before I threw a handful of "mega marine" into my mouth, I realized what i had and carefully put it back into the cannister.

I related this story to S.A., who was standing nearby, as a humorous display of my sickness. She stated that it'd nbo big deal as it was just ocean veggies.

I replied that though it might not be life-threatening, it would be very disgusting, as it's made of ground up fish.

She was incredulous. "It is??"

I proceeded to read off the ingredients. Ground Salmon, halibut, sardines, etc.

She looked at me with an extremely perplexed look on her face.

"How come they don't get 'Mad Fish Disease'?" she asked.

Her delivery was deadpan enough that I thought she was serious. I laughed so hard I almost wet my pants.

I love my wife.

Laterz.

Ho Hum...

2005-10-20T09:53:00.000-04:00

Random thoughts that will undoubtedly interest no-one but myself.

1. "My" secretary has 1 eye. Actually, she has 2 eyes, but only one works. They're removing the other one the day before Thanksgiving. For some reason, I can't help but feel like my life has been leading up to this.

2. I have a regular reader in California. I mean, I have folks check in from all over the country, but most of them don't show up very often. My regular readers are generally my friends in real life who have spread out all over the country. They read me because, well, they have to. Whoever reads this blog in California actually seems to care because his/her IP shows up quite often. It's a little strange.

3. While I was in college, I worked for 2 professional athletic teams. I worked in the Sports Information office at the college for 4 years. I coached 2 sports at 4 schools.

Since I graduated, more than 5 years ago, with a degree in Sport Management, my only sports employment was 1 season of JV softball at a local high school. However, in those 5 years I've worked as a video store manager, a secretary, and a computer instructor.

So that's $80,000+ well-spent tuition dollars.

4. I belong to a golf league during the summer and a bowling league the rest of the year.

I am (at least at times) a pretty decent golfer. Additionally, I don't pay for my league membership because I do some work for the golf course.

I'm a truly shitty bowler. And I pay $13 a week to bowl. That comes out to over $400 for the season.

I do not enjoy my golf league.

I LOVE my bowling league.

I don't get it, either.

It's game time!

2005-10-12T14:49:00.000-04:00

Just got back from G.R. where we went to the Pissers first pre-season game. It was S.A.'s b-day yesterday, so this was part of her present. We attended to game with her sister Rachel and Rach's husband Jeff. Very enjoyable game, with one very minor exception.

Jeff and Rachel chipped in with us so that we could have very good seats at the game. The seats directly in front of us remained empty throughout the 1st half, but at halftime, a couple decided that those seats looked great and since they weren't being used... So they sat in front of us.

I have no problem with seat jumpers. I've done it myself at many sporting events and I do think that there's no reason to let the seats go to waste. However, I and also not a drunken asshole. This could not be said for the gentleman who sat down directly in front of me. He had so much alcohol in him that he was visibly shaking. This, however, did not prevent him from jumping up and down and screaming about things that didn't draw any reaction from the rest of the crowd. I realized that his behavior was not only irritating me, but making it impossible for S.A. to see any of the action. I decided that I needed to ask the gentleman to sit down.

This, however, required some amount of planning, because most drunks at sporting events are also belligerent, in my experience. The fact that he was obviously with a date made this possibility even more likely. Also, because we were sitting at the front of the upper deck, I was afraid that if he took a swing at me and I ended up punching him, there was a decent chance that, in his obviously balance-impaired state, he would fall over the railing. Regardless of how aggravating he was, I really didn't need to kill him.

S.A., on the other hand decided to do the more mature, if somewhat less cathartic, thing. She stood up walked over to the female usher at the top of the stairs and politely asked her to deal with the idiot in front of us. When the usher asked to see his ticket and saw that his assigned seats were ACROSS THE ARENA, she asked them to get out of her section. Fans around us applauded. The usher walked back over to S.A. and gave her arm a friendly squeeze. They were obviously sister enforcers.

Jeff, who had been pointedly ignoring the moron and concentrating on the game, leaned over and asked me what had happened. I told him that the guy had been convicted of "Drunk in front of S.A."

After that, the game went smoothly. The Pistons won and we both got a decent night's sleep at R&J's. It was a good time and, I think, a very happy birthday for S.A.

Also, just because she sometimes wishes I'd make grand-er gestures in public I offer this-

Happy Birthday S.A.
I Love You!

Laterz.

We are Turtles! Hear us roar!

2005-10-11T10:38:00.000-04:00

I recently wrote about my bowling team. We are know far and wide as not being... well... not good. Generally speaking, we suck. However, I also said that we were improving.

I was right.

Last night the Tropic Cove Albino Turtles (so named in honor of a $250 turtle Kevin purchased this weekend at a trade show in Chicago,) won. Handily. We won all seven points. We should be the T.C. Pin Piranhas. My dad, who in this case was obviously chanelling his alter-ego Tomas, was on fire. He rolled a 490 series and basically carried us to a resounding victory.

The only down point to the evening came on what should have been a highlight for me. Starting in high school, the vast majority of the games I've bowled have been with my buddy Nate. We always made sure, however, to make sure that we had at least a couple of gals with us when we bowled. The reason for this is that we've had a long-standing rule that if either of us ever managed to roll a "turkey" (3 strikes in a row) the ladies would "flash" us. I think it almost goes without saying that the gals were never in any real danger. Over the past 10 years, both he and I had 2 consecutive strikes many, many times. However, given the pressure that we always heaped on each other when we got to that point, neither of us has ever been even close to that elusive third consective strike. It got to the point where some of our more regular bowling companions would torment us with comments about the high quality of their undergarments, because they knew it was the only way we were ever going to know anything about them.

Last night I rolled a 97 in the first game and a 120 in the second game. Both below my average, but not as far below as I'd like. The last game I spared the 9th frame and had a 122 going into the 10th. I proceeded to throw a strike. With my 2nd ball of the 10th frame, I threw another strike. Joking the whole time with my opponents, I went back to the line for my 3rd ball and, wonder of wonders, threw another strike. Even our opponents were excited and all gave my high-fives as a 10th frame turkey is rare. Especially in our league. So I finished with a 162, which is WAY above my average.

Upon returning to my team's table, I realized that somebody was supposed to flash me. I looked around but all the people around me were middle-aged men. Man boobies were NOT what I was looking for.

Aargh.

So I've been cheated. But at least we won. And now I figure somebody owes me a flash.

I hope to God my mother-in-law doesn't read this and agree with me.

Laterz

Family Photos

2005-10-05T13:30:00.000-04:00

S.A. recently pointed out to me that I might want to put pics of the fam on my blog, since I write about them enough. So here are a few.

Princess Roxie, the day she returned home from the Hospital, sans leg. And another pic from a couple days ago. Notice she's adjusted very well to the messing leg, but she'll only allow herself to be photographed from her "good side".
This is Velma. She looks perpetually confused and has a touch of what we lovingly refer to as "runt brain", meaning that all her wires are carrying current, but some of them are definitely soldered to the wrong spot on the motherboard.
This is Elphie. She's the new baby and the only one who's not named from the musical "Chicago". (Her full name is Elphaba, from "Wicked".)

Can I go home yet?

2005-10-04T14:58:00.000-04:00

I'm now officially at the time-killing stage of my day. I've done my 2 trainings and earned my paycheck and now I'm just killing time so I don't leave so early as to look bad. So I'm browsing other blogs and checking out the user profiles of the folks who write them.

A few notes.

There's another guy in Petoskey with a blog devoted completely to juggling.

I've read more than one profile where the author lists "weight-training" or "lifting weights" as a hobby. Not surprisingly, none of these bloggers could spell worth a damn.

Females are much more likely to write about their daily lives. Guys are more likely to rant. I don't stay long on a rant-infested blog. I don't watch Survivor, Big Brother, or any of the other popular "reality" shows. Reading blogs is my own personal form of voyeurism. I enjoy getting to feel like I know the blogger a little bit. Therefore, the only blog I read that's written by a guy is actually written by the best man from my wedding.

If you don't have a decent sense of humor, don't blog. I mean, I know there are all types of blogs and the original intent of blogging was to impart and share information, not to entertain, but still, there's nothing worse than a really DRY blog.

Alright, that's all I've got for now. I'm outta here.

Laterz.

And the shut-out is officially over!

2005-10-04T11:22:00.000-04:00

For those of you who may not know, (which is probably most of you, because i don't really talk about it that much) I'm in a bowling league. My team consists of myself, my dad, my buddy Kev, his dad, and a 2-headed bowling monster of Mark, who teaches with my dad, and Daryl, Kev's Dad's golf partner. (They bowl on alternating weeks.) We make up the Tropic Cove... Somethings. We don't actually have a team name yet. We have a sponsor, though. Tropic Cove. We could have used Joe's, my golf shop, but there's a $40 sponsorship fee and I didn't feel like forking it over. This week, we were the Tropic Cove Rabid Canarys. Last week it was the Tropic Cove Betta Bowlers. I'm proposing the Angry Ferrets for next week. Truth be known, we should be called the Tropic Cove Spastic Invalids, because you'll seldom see an uglier display of bowling acumen.

It's a good time. I love to bowl; always have. However, I don't generally broadcast my league membership. It's not that I'm not proud of my team, it's just that, well... we suck.

Seriously, we're awful. My dad hadn't bowled more than a handful of times in the past 25 years before he joined the team. Daryl bowled last night for the 1st time in 35 years. Phil's dad hadn't bowled in over 20 years. It'd been 15 years for Mark. And Kevin and I... Well, we've bowled more recently, but we still really suck. We both fall into the "please let my score be in triple-digits" category.

Last night, however, we actually won a game! Not the match, mind you. We still got our asses handed to us for the evening. But we won a game. Officially, we have now won 2 out of a possible 28 points this season. Things are definitely looking up. My new bowling shoes will be here tomorrow. I've already picked out my new bowling ball and now just need to convince someone to buy it for me.

I feel a hot streak coming on. Also, if you know Dave the techie at C.O.P., you should probably express your condolences. It's his team we beat.

Laterz

Puh-leeeeze forgive me...

2005-10-03T11:37:00.000-04:00

Alright, I know I'm a truly shitty blogger.

It's been so long since I wrote anything that I've started receiving nasty email from my mother-in-law berating me for my lack of diligence. The thing is, I've got an excuse! Honestly, I do.

I'm a lazy bastard.

Hey, I didn't say it was a good excuse. Basically, I havent' written in quite a while because I generally (read: ALWAYS) blog when I don't really have anything better to do at work. I don't let it get in the way of doing my job, but I've always had at least a little bit of time to kill during the day, so I blog. Unfortunately, I've recently been much busier than normal at work. Hence, no blogging. But I promise I'll do better, starting today. In fact, depending on how much time I have the next few days, I may even go back and write entries for previous days when stuff happened but I didn't bother to write about it, because that's the type of diligent, hard-working blogger I intend to be from now on. (Also, I will try not to end any more sentances with prepositions.)

Today is a big day. Sarah has officially been pregnant for more than 12 weeks now, which means we are now into the 2nd trimester. Over the course of the past 3 months, I've learned something very important about myself. The biggest reason I have cared so much about things that don't directly impact me, such as national politics, is that there really hasn't been all that much going on that DID impact me. Since we found out that Sarah was pregnant, I've almost stopped listening to NPR or Air America Radio and instead spend a great deal of time reading about pregnancy and worrying about things like debt consolidation. Today I have the unenviable task of requesting a raise from my bosses. Now, they did tell me when I hired on that I could expect a raise after 90 days, but I'm still not comfortable pressing these things. So now I have heartburn. Narf.

Anyway, wish me luck.

Laterz.

More wholy irrelevant facts about me.

2005-09-16T15:32:00.000-04:00

Ten Years Ago: I had just started my senior year of high school. I lived with my folks, but not in the same building. I was actually thankful that they allowed me to live in the guest house most of the time. I didn’t realize that I was really doing them a favor by sparing them my presence. I drove a 1991 Teal Mazda Protégé that got 42 miles per gallon on a bad day, was, would go from 0 to 60 in under 6 minutes flat, and was lovingly know as “The Rice Burner”.

Five Years Ago: In September of 2000, I was a newlywed living in Lansing, Michigan. I was a graduate student and teaching assistant at Michigan State University, teaching “Coaching Baseball/Softball” and “Intermediate Softball”. I also took 3 classes but I don’t remember them. I quit school after that semester. I drove a 1991 Dodge Caravan, given to me by my new Mother-In-Law, when she was unable to convince any poor sap to actually buy it from her. Though all the doors opened just fine from the inside, it only had one hatch that was useable to enter the vehicle. My students at MSU LOVED watching me climb through the rear hatch of my minivan and crawl through the vehicle up to the driver’s seat so I could spew blue smoke behind me exiting campus.

One Year Ago: I was the store manager of 2 Blockbuster Video stores in Petoskey, as well as the owner of a small golf shop. I lived in a manufactured house on a very nice lot in P-town. I drove a ’98 Nissan Sentra with a number of Diversity bumper stickers on it, as well as power locks and windows. S.A. had just started a new job at the Woman’s Resource Center and we had been trying to start a family for a few months.

Yesterday: I taught “Microsoft Excel: Level I” for The Learning Center. Sarah came home and craved Burger King food. Pregnancy is really strange. We don’t even LIKE Burger King… I helped dig a trench from my house to my shop so I can run gas line out to the furnace in the golf shop.

Five Songs I Know All the Words To: I know every word to basically every song I’ve ever heard. That being said, I can easily perform on command-
Rainbow Connection – Kermit the Frog
Lodi – Creedence Clearwater Revival
Studebaker – Jordan Zevon
Oliver’s Army – Elvis Costello
Crocodile Rock – Elton John

Five Snacks: Edy’s Rocky Road Ice Cream, Sam’s Choice Crackers, Fresh Apples (Fresh is the key word. I don’t generally like apples from the store.), Garlic Melba Toast, Crab & Cocktail Sauce over Cream Cheese w/ Triscuits

Five Things I'd Do With $100 Million: Pay off every college loan for every one of my friends; buy the 10 acres next to my parents and build a kick-ass barn-style house; build my own recording studio; give my parents whatever they figured to be able to retire TODAY; give the rest to Sylvia, because she and Danno help us out as often as my folks do and I know she’d find all sorts of great causes to give it to.

Five Places I'd Run Away To: Miami, Miami, Miami, Miami, and for a change of pace, my folks house.

Five Things I'd Never Wear: Anything supporting President Bush , anything supporting the republican party in general, a v-neck sweater, briefs (seriously, how do you guy in your tighty-whities stand it?), a raccoon. (Would you?)

Five Favorite TV Shows: Queer as Folk, West Wing, Baseball Tonight, Any Detroit Pistons Telecast on FSN with Greg Kelser and Fred MacLeod, Celebrity Poker Showdown

Five Greatest Joys: Having an Animated Discussion w/ My Wife While Driving, playing piano in the dark, napping with Roxie on my chest (even though I invariably wake up with a cold), poker with all "my kids", lying in bed with S.A. talking about all the great stuff we’re gonna do with the baby

Five Favorite Toys: 3 words – SUPER MONKEY BALL. Also my Cleveland Launcher 400 Driver, Jeff’s postal Jeep (WHICH IS WHY I NEED MY OWN), Strat-O-Matic Baseball (1991 Season), my new Fire Poker from Yvonne

1. What is your favorite word? Bean (Also my favorite person, hmm…)
2. What is your least favorite word? Fidget (You hate it too, if you’d been told to stop doing it as much as I have.)
3. What turns you on creatively, spiritually or emotionally? The ability to make me laugh out loud.
4. What turns you off? REPUBLICANS!!!!!
5. What is your favorite curse word? Goddamnmutherfuckingcocksmoke… (I got this from Nate, years ago.)
6. What sound or noise do you love? My wife snoring. (Seriously)
7. What sound or noise do you hate? Gunshots
8. What profession other than your own would you like to attempt? Professional musician
9. What profession would you not like to do? Accountant
10.If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates? “There are some old people with funny-ass names waiting inside for you.” (Seriously, I hope God cusses like a sailor.)

7 things...

2005-09-15T22:26:00.000-04:00

Stole this one from Andrew Andrew.

7 Things I Plan To Do Before I Die
___________________________________
1) Teach my kids to play baseball/softball, basketball, football, volleyball, and golf.
2) Give them the opportunity to decide that sports are a waste of time and that their time is better spent writing poetry. (And make sure they know I'll love 'em anyway.)
3) Take my son to every major league baseball stadium. (Yeah, it'd be cool with a daughter, too, but somehow, in my mind's eye...)
4) Golf in Scotland.
5) Record an album. Just me and a piano. (Okay, maybe a few friends on guitars and the like might be helpful, too.)
6) Become the President. (Of my kids' school board.)
7) Visit Prague with S.A. I may not have much of a sense of history, but it's her favorite place in the world and I truly want to share it with her.
__________________________________
7 Things I Cannot Do
__________________________________
1) Enjoy gross-out/sophmoric comedy movies. (Movies like "Wedding Crashers" and "Old School" make me want to punch people.
2) Walk more than 15 feet without "sprinkling". (This is my mom's term for whistling without enough air to really blow a note so it's just kind of airy sounding.)
3) Hear ANYTHING about our current president without becoming violently angry. I've actually stopped listening to NPR because I was afraid I was going to intentionally ram my car into an SUV at some point.
4) Keep my foot out of my mouth when regarding my wife's extended family. I actually LIKE her family, but I still manage to offend them regularly.
5) Convince myself that I do not actually NEED a Jeep. (Seriously, I am SO in need of a 12-step program.)
6) Make myself understand why appearances matter. Cars, houses, people, cribs, clothes... I'm just too logical, I guess.
7) Give up on humanity. Even time I come to terms with the idea that people in the U.S. are just not ever going to meet my standards, somebody goes and does something great and get my hopes up all over again. (My Mother-In-Law just offered up her home to any person or family who has been displaced my Hurricane Katrina. She lives in Northern Michigan but figures that if somebody makes it this far north, she'll definitely take 'em in. Kudos, Sylv. My Grandpa Beaver would be proud of you. So would Grandma Alice.)
______________________________
7 Things That Attract me to the same or opposite sex
______________________________
I'm nt goona say the cheeseball thing and put "a sense of humor", but only because it's not specific enough. Instead I'll lead off with-
1) A SHARP sense of humor. Nothing makes me laugh more than my wife shredding someone else. (I hope this doesn't make me a bad person.)
2) A flare for a witty turn-of-phrase. "Like ants on a twinkie," is one of the great similes of our time.
3) A great smile. And there is no other kind. Anyone is 100 times more attractive when they're smiling.
4) Hair. I never really knew I was a hair guy until I met my wife. Now, if I'm good, she'll let me brush her hair before bed.
5) Self-confidence. Know who you are and stand up for that person.
6) Intelligence. The ability to formulate a persuasive argument is SEXY.
7) Compassion and empathy. Nothing is more attractive than seeing that someone cares about something other than themselves.
_________________________
7 Things I Say Most Often
_________________________
1) "Bloody" I really do wish I was British.
2) "Bean" My pet name for S.A.
3) "Good grief!" I've worked really hard to curse less than I used to.
4) "Booger" Besides my obvious affinity for words beginning with "B", it's another one of those exclamations that keeps me from swearing at work.
5) "DUDE!" This one really only crops up when I'm around my friends from H.S. or college.
6)"If I was any father out on the left wing, the plane would flip over." (Describing my political views.) This first time I said this, I thought it was pretty witty. Years later, I don't find it nearly as charming. But people keep laughing at it, so I keep saying it. I'm a laugh whore.
7) "Yeesh..." I don't say this as much as I type it in email and IMs.
_______________________
7 Celebrity Crushes
_______________________
1) Vivica Fox. I'm not really a breast guy but, well, Yeesh...
2) Jessica Alba
3) Christina Ricci
4) Scarlett Johansen
5) Hilary Duff (S.A's gonna hate this one since I think she's still underaged and, as S.A. points out regularly, she has no neck.)
6) Natalie Portman
7) On VH1's "I Love the 90's", Jay & Silent Bob had a bit called "Guys I'd Go Gay For." #7 is my list that S.A. and I have joked about that the past couple years. In no particular order-
Hugh Grant, Phil Gordon (From Celebrity Poker Showdown), Dave Foley, and it seems like I'm missing someone, but I'm sure S.A. will point him out.

Perhaps a peg-leg?

2005-09-07T10:16:00.000-04:00

Most of already know that we have two cats, Roxie and Velma. When we fed them this morning, Sarah realized that, though Roxie joined us to eat, she was not putting any weight on her right hind leg. When I picked her up, I found that her leg was hanging limply from the hip joint, although, quite surprisingly, she did not hiss or scratch when I felt the leg, trying to find a break.

I took her to Jensen's Animal Hospital where a childhood friend, Sarah Ginop, is now a vet. Sarah called me a few hours later to tell me that Roxie had been hit by a car and had broken femur in 2 places. Thankfully, undoubtedly because of Roxie's predilection for neatness, she had cleaned herself so well that there was absolutely no sign of infection. Sometimes being an uppity snot is a good thing, I guess. However, do to the severity of the break, the best option for a full recovery was to amputate the leg.

Roxie has always been a beautiful cat. You know that old adage about there being girls you date and girls you marry? Roxie is definitely a girl you date. She's pitch black with a white muzzle, white tummy, and white feet. (In case you wondered, Velma is a girl you marry. Cute enough, and you know that she'll always love you, but you also know that all those bugs she eats are gonna go straight to her hips.) I guess now instead of doing that kitty calendar that S.A. and I have joked about, she's gonna have to do an amputee calendar with Heather McCartney.

Anyway, she'll have her surgery later this afternoon or early tomorrow, so we should be able to bring her home on Friday. She'll be living in the guest room, since even I , with my allergies, can't bring myself to make her stay outside, even in the shop, while she's recuperating. So everybody keep her in your thoughts and prayers. (Even though you should already be thinking of the homeless in New Orleans about 24/7.)

Laterz

Yo Ho Ho...

2005-08-29T13:41:00.000-04:00

We went to Michigan's Adventure / Whitewater Adventure this weekend. I love water parks and I enjoy a number of amusement park rides, so it was a good day. However, the highlight of the whole experience is an easy call.

Jeff, Matt, and I took my nephew Joe on the pirate ship ride. You know the one; the ship swings side to side so you're looking straight down and then you're straight up and then... Anyway, we've all done it and we all enjoy it and since Joe actually likes roller coasters, we thought he'd probably like the pirate ship.

We climbed on and started the ride but on the second or third ride Joe made a strange yelp at the moment when you start to quickly descend and it feels like you've left your stomach behind. Jeff and I looked at each other thinking that we thought we might have recognized the tone of his yelp and when we swung back up and then descended again, Joe cleared up any doubt for us.

At the moment when everyone else on the ride raised their arms and screamed, Joe grabbed ahold of his "junk" and screamed "The wind's pressing my Wee Wee!". We laughed and figured we might want to mention to him that this probably wasn't an appropriate thing for a 9-year-old to yell on a public ride, but we really didn't worry, because we knew that no-one outside our group had heard him.

All of us were chuckling as the ride came to an end, thinking of how we should check to make sure he wasn't in too much discomfort when he turned around in his seat to face Jeff and I and exclaimed "Let's go AGAIN!!!"

Yet another way that amusement parks rock.

Laterz

Boredom

2005-08-26T12:30:00.000-04:00

After about 2 weeks of being absolutely up to my eyeballs in jobs to do at work, I've hit a momentary lull. Though I suppose I could spend this extra time wisely, possibly getting ahead on some projects, since I know that it'll be much more difficult to get to them in the future, I've really just been killing time for about the last hour. I've read all my regular web sites (freep.com, detnews.com, si.com) and checked in with all my regular blogs (S.A., Drew, Amy) and now I've got nothing to do.
Now, mind you, I did manage to offend someone with a comment I left at one blog, so I had to leave another comment clarifying the first comment and making sure no-one thought I was ripping on the blogger. (Good grief... I spend so much time back-peddling, I should play cornerback.) And Drew's not adding much to his blog today. Something about power outages due to some hurricane in Miami. S.A. and Amy seem to be focusing on their actual jobs, so they're not writing either.

All in all, I need more stuff to read. I used to read Dave Barry's column in the Miami Herald every so often, but he retired from regular writing, so it's just reprints now. I get tired of reading politics right now, since nothing's really happening because everyone in the federal government is on vacation right now. Ironic, isn't it. I wonder if the kids getting shot at overseas get a vacation.

Anyway, if anybody's got any good suggestions, pass 'em along. Know any blogs worth reading? (The quality and style of the writing is much more important to me than the actual content.) I'm all ears. Alright. Time to waste more time.

Laterz

More Jeeps and The Fine Art of Placenta Building

2005-08-26T09:44:00.000-04:00

Morning, all.

1st item. Today is my Anniversary. S.A. and I have now been married for 5 years. (Nate says this is our Nickel Anniversary and I have to give her something worth a nickel.) If you're having difficulty deciding what to give us as an anniversary present, send cash. Or baby stuff. But for God's sake, DON'T GIVE US A JEEP!

We had a somewhat long and involved "discussion" this morning because I received email for a gentleman in Tennessee who was interested in taking our baby grand piano of our hands (which really need to happen soon, by the way,) in exchange for a running, but still needing work Postal Jeep. Needless to say, this idea excites me. I REEEAAAALLLLYYY want a jeep. S.A. is concerned that once I have one, the charm will wear off and it will sit in our storage space covered in useless crap until the end of time. This is probably a valid fear, as I do have a track record that points to a certain lack of attention span and follow-through as far as my hobbies are concerned.

However, I am absolutely convinced that there is absolutely no way I would lose interest in this one. No matter, though. I told her that I have already made it clear on all my Jeep web sites (I told you I was fixated.) that I will not be accepting any donations for the time being. This is true. However, if this guy contacts me again with a good plan... Well, I shudder to think about it.

-------------------------------------

I stopped by "the boys" house last night on my way home from golf league. Johnny, Adrian, (Not a "boy", but she lives there anyway.) Trav, and Liam had a barbecue and I want to stop by even though I'd missed the actual food part. Anyway, it was really nice to see the boys, as well as some of their family members (Johhny's dad, Tim, was there as were Trav's mom and sister.). They were disappointed, however, that S.A. had not accompanied me, so I explained to them that she was already in bed.

That's what she does right now. She sleeps. She's explained to me that it takes a great deal of energy to build a placenta and I can't really argue much because I have never, personally, built one. Trav said I should try it. He figured I have a well equipped shop and a supply of jell-o. He figured the discussion would go something like this-

S.A.- "Get in here! It's time for dinner!"
Me- "I can't! Could you bring me some more jello? I'm trying to build a new placenta!"
S.A.- "You never let me have ANYTHING for myself!"

This is why I love those kids.

Laterz

You know, I really DO tend to step in it...

2005-08-22T08:51:00.000-04:00

This weekend, S.A.'s brother Matt came up to help Tomas and myself to split up sections of a 100-year-old+ white pine that came down in a lightning storm a couple years ago in my folks yard. S.A.'s folks also came up, so my mom, Sylv, and S.A. went baby shopping and Danno helped us with the tree.

If any of you have never had the opportunity to use a hydraulic splitter, get on it. It's quite enjoyable. However, when working with a large pile of wood, especially wood that is extremely ant-infested, be careful of who might be living in said pile.

I picked up (okay, rolled) one of the logs, a good sized specimen, about 18 inches high and at least 30 inches in diameter, as I was pushing it towards the splitter I felt something move under my foot. I, as you might guess, picked my foot up and moved quickly forward, at which point Danno exclaimed, "Watch out!"

I turned around in time to see an obviously unhappy skunk sprinting off into the underbrush. I'm happy to report, to those of you who may have ready S.A.'s earlier report on skunk behavior, that this skunk made no attempt to do a hand-stand, no did it (evidently) try to spray me. It just took off.

I noted to the rest of the guys that, if anyone was going to step on a skunk, it was almost a given that it would be me. No one argued.

Laterz