Three Hour Tour...

Heart & the Red Cross

2010-12-01T22:21:00.005-06:00

Today the Red Cross came to my work today to suck blood from some of the employees. It’s really a great arrangement. The Red Cross is able to reach people that would otherwise find it inconvenient to give & my employer is able to give back to the community & world in a way that only costs 45min-1hr of productivity per giver every 4 months. The employee also gains satisfaction in giving & is able to snack on sandwiches, popcorn & cookies. But this isn’t why I write today.

When the Red Cross workers come, they bring music. Not often heard in the halls of corporate America. Most of the times it’s the hip hop crap played on popular radio stations. (Does that sound old-mannish enough? If not, imagine me standing on my porch in my dark colored socks, loafers, plaid shorts & t-shirt shaking my fist in the air. Dang kids now-a-days!) But today it was good music – Heart’s Greatest Hits. I dig girl bands, especially if they can really rock. Nancy Wilson can wield a mighty axe & her sister Ann has a fine set of pipes. But this still isn’t the point of my post.

When the song “Never” started to play, I was taken back to the good ol’ days of MTV (back when they used to be about music television) & the video for the song. Nancy wearing big 80s hair & a push-up top, rocking out with her guitar & kicking in a most unladylike fashion. Ann was there too, except they were trying to hide her weight, only showing her briefly from the shoulders up & in the shadows. And I just had to smile.

There are songs & images that will forever be linked. This caused me to think about other songs that will always be linked to their videos. Here’s a quick short non-exhaustive list from me:

“Come On Eileen” – Dexy’s Midnight Runners Who could forget the group dancing on the street corner in overalls w/o shirts?

“Jeopardy” – Greg Kihn Band The image of the corpse bride & the priest instructing the groom on how to place the ring on the finger.

“Thriller” – Michael Jackson Street dancing zombies

“Rio” – Duran Duran The 3-paneled boat pictures

“Photograph” – Def Leopard Chalk outline & British flag

“Addicted To Love” – Robert Palmer The girls. Awesome.

So, what are some of your favorite songs linked to video or images?

THIS is what I was missing?

2008-05-18T19:48:00.007-05:00

Before the fall of 2006 when I received my CPAP, I rarely dreamed, if at all. Or if I did dream, I never remember them. Severe sleep apnea doesn't let you reach REM sleep which is where all the good stuff happens. Shortly after beginning treatment, I began to remember them...or at least that I had one. Most have been your standard fair, really. Luge lessons, meat helmets, inventing the question mark, etc. But last nights still has me scratching my head "huh?"

It started out with me and the guys eating at the local KFC when Bill shows up. He says "Sup?" in customary fashion, then makes an exit with the owner to the "upstairs" of the KFC. I think nothing of it and return home from work where Prudence is watching TMZ-like footage of "the final moments of Bill." I tell her I just saw him today at lunch. Apparently when he went upstairs, he walked in on a ping pong tournament and tripped over something - maybe a stray ping pong ball - cracking his head open. Fortunately for the tabloids - which are constantly following him - someone had video of him meeting us for lunch, then of the accident that claimed his life. This was playing repeatedly on TV and people like Larry King were talking about it. Then I woke up. But I was still in a dream.

It turns out that I was really dreaming within my dream. I don't know where I was when I woke up from the "Death of Bill" dream, but apparently they had moved one of the accounting buildings from UIUC to my work as I went there to meet some of my friends to tell them about the dream. When I walked in, I found Danimal escorting Triple J Newbie around the premises. Triple J is actually not a work friend, but a very good friend from my college days. Now he's a big wig in large national corporation. But in this dream he'd given up that career to become a motivational/inspirational speaker or life coach. Not the Chris Farley kind - more like the bald guy you see during PBS pledge drives. Danimal - who has no business doing this - was escorting Triple J around the grounds, attracting huge crowds and stopping every so often to give people neck rubs. That's when I woke up.

I'm not sure what this says about my subconscious, but I pretty sure I need to (a) apologize to Bill and Danimal and (b) spend more "quality time" with Prudence.

Maybe Elmer Fudd should drive a car

2008-05-16T08:11:00.003-05:00

Last Monday the guy with the big tiller came to Casa de ssminnow7 to work up my garden. Tuesday I planted 2 cucumber plants, 4 jalapeno plants and 16 tomato plants. Wednesday I consulted the dude with the best tomatoes (his ALWAYS looks so great!) to get his advice on the best ways to fertilize and stake up my garden. Friday I mowed, and while I went around my garden I found this:

I don't know what the Chinese calendar says, but as far as I'm concerned it's the Year of the Rabbit. There have been bunnies-a-plenty in my neighborhood. Normally, Lance (our golden retriever) keeps them our of our yard by his mere presence. But this year the numbers are too great, which must make them bold. I've even see them eating some of the clover which grows in the area where Lance does his business (weed killing - yet another job I need to get done this week!). He knows it, too, because he darts to the area every time I let him out.

This morning Lance and I were taking our morning walk. We typically cross a fairly busy country road to go to our church to make a lap or two around the property. Today we found not one but 2 rabbit roadkills that weren't there last night. My guess is that they got a little too bold. Or they suck at Frogger.

Either way, maybe Elmer Fudd should invest in an SUV...

Brown-Good, Red-BAD!

2008-03-10T22:32:00.002-05:00

Over the last 6-8 months, I've been trying to live a better diabetic lifestyle. Cutting out carbs where I can. Gone are the late night ice cream treats, standard fast-food joint combo meals, and extra helpings of mashed potatoes.

Suck.

Well, at least I still had my caffeinated drinks. That was until I read multiple reports like this, which say that caffeine inhibits the body's ability to process sugars via insulin. I felt my numbers weren't reflecting the sacrifices I was making to get them lower, so I decided to see if this study was true. So on January 8th, I began my caffeine-free diet. Almost immediately I saw my numbers lower by as much as 20 points. Finally, an encouraging turn! But now I was relegated to drinking water (no flavor) and caffeine-free Diet Pepsi (brown crayon water).

Double Suck.

On Wednesday of this week I was whining to a lady coworker about how much I hate my eating life when she told me about flavor packets for water. Basically, adult Kool-Aid with aspartame. She offered me a few packets - grape (her favorite), lemonade, cherry lemonade, and raspberry ice. So beginning Thursday, I started my second (third, fourth, or nth) childhood. Grape was good. The lemonade flavors left gunk at the back of my throat. But the raspberry ice showed promise.

This morning I had 40 oz of the raspberry ice mixture. Things went well until about 10am when I felt The Urge. You know The Urge. If you say you don't know The Urge, you're lying. It's the one where you feel like Jim Phelps from Mission Impossible hearing the message that your colon will self-destruct in 60 seconds. Hopefully you're not in a car, in the boss' office, on the phone, with a long-winded co-worker, or - gasp! - giving a presentation or speech! Luckily, I could hit the "send calls" button and quickly scoot to the basement bathroom.

Interlude...

I have a lot of bathroom rules - one of which is that you don't show your co-workers "who Number 2 works for." The sounds and smells that are produced are best left anonymous, and that can only be accomplished by not letting the people who know you see you walk out of the stall. Hence, I go to another location. And the beautiful thing is that no one expects to see me in the basement bathroom. Score! Now, back to the story....

I arrive at the "Cadillac of the poopin' stools" - the handicrapper - and do my business. A little more liquid than what I like, but nothing that I wasn't expecting based on The Urge. As I left I sensed that I wasn't quite "finished" but felt that it was "safe" to return to my desk. Forty-five minutes later I was back. Even more liquid, but now with a red tint. Lunch followed with a trip to the potty about an hour later. This time all liquid, AND ALL RED! I couldn't believe what I was seeing! It was almost like the Nile water-turned-to-blood scene from "The Ten Commandments". I began to freak out. All I could do was clean up and run! I'm not even sure I flushed! The next user was likely to have a heart attack from what he would see. Scratch that - it'd probably be me based on the 3 "big potties" at work today (a record I hope not to break)...

When I got back to my desk, I looked at one of the packages I'd been ingesting (not digesting). It said: "Crystal Light On The Go!"

I should say so.

POST SCRIPT: Prudence was reviewing this post (lucky lady!). She questioned the use of the manufacturer's name in the post and pondered whether I could be sued. Then we joked that all I needed was a 40oz drink and about 3 hours to produce the evidence. I think I'm in the clear...unlike my pooh.

Feeling Pops Pull

2008-03-06T00:50:00.002-06:00

I'm probably in the deepest writing funk since I started blogging 3 years ago. Not for a lack of material. The kids say and do the darndest things. The guys at work are a gnat's hair away from being an ensemble cast in a sitcom. And I'm as neurotic as George Costanza. But I can't get the stories to come out of my head. So I sit in front of my monitor and wait. Days become weeks, which then becomes months. So what do to break the cycle? Write something. And when I can't write about anything else, I can always write about music.

Last year about this time I professed my love for Fountains of Wayne. But in working thru the obsession, I discovered it was more about my love for pop music. As much as I try to branch out into other genres and groups, I'm always drawn back to pop music. The hooks, guitar licks, drum beats, harmonies, and clever/cliche lines cut deep into the vinyl of my life. My XM presets include Top Tracks, Big Tracks, The Loft, Fred, Lucy, MLB, and XM Starbucks Cafe, but buttons 6, 7 and 8 are almost worn out from The 60s, 70s, and 80s, where the kings and queens of pop music live.

But as much as it pains me to say it, I was growing tired of my music. I needed something new. Enter FoW. But it didn't end there. Thanks to Amazon and iTune's precognitive software, they led me to a whole host of pop albums and artists. Below is a mix that I put together based on some of the new stuff I discovered, and some of the older/rarer stuff I had. And when I say new, you need to be thinking "used car." It's new to me - and that's all that matters.

"Number 45 Sunblock/Maureen" by Fountains of Wayne
This may be my favorite opening to an album ever, and it was the perfect kickoff for the mix! "Maureen" has every element that makes a pop song great. I catch myself humming it at least once a week, and then I can't get it out of my head until I listen to something else. And I'm okay with that. If you want to listen to the song (and watch some Japanese Anime), take a listen to this YouTube clip.
"Adelaide" by Anberlin
Fantastic drum work with infectious vocals. Check out this clip, although you really need to listen to a quality MP3 or CD to get the full drum effect.
"Break It Out" by The Rocket Summer
The vocals from this kid make me think of Michael Jackson. The energy and message from this song picks me up every time I listen to it. Yet another clip.
"We Do This To Ourselves" by Sherwood
Very simple song with some great hooks that makes me nod my head to the rhythm - almost like Eddie Rabbit's "I Love a Rainy Night", except its good. Does it exist on YouTube? You bet!
"Folk Singer" by Brendan Benson
Every person reading this blog needs to go out and buy/download this song and the album - "Lapalco" - it's from. I mean it! Stop what you're doing and go buy it! Now!!! At least go take a listen. It came out of nowhere to be in my top 20 albums. Great music and lyrics. My favorite lyric is: "ain't got time for my beddin' she said, 'Stop pretending. Your not John Lennon.'"
"Miracle Medicine" by Jason Falkner
Now that you've bought "Lapalco", go buy "Presents Author Unknown"! Didn't think this entry was going to be this demanding, did you? It's an absolute treat! But sorry, its the first one on the list w/o YouTube representation.
"All I Have" by Mike Viola & The Candy Butchers
Mike may have the perfect voice for pop music. I love this guys vocals! So much so, I've included...
"That Thing You Do" by The Wonders
Yup. Maybe my all-time favorite 60s single that was never a single. I could listen to an 80 minute disc of just this song. Maybe my next mix...if you can call one song a mix. Take a listen!
"Paperback Writer" by The Beatles
Yeah, there are probably better pop songs from the Fab Four, but this song just doesn't get enough pub. It really showcases Harrison's guitar work, and proves that Ringo can really play the drums! No good versions on YouTube, but you've probably already heard it before.
"Bus Stop" by The Hollies
What a fun song! Probably should have put it after Maureen based on the lyrics, but it had a better feel here in the 60s set... No video.
"I Wanna Be With You" by The Raspberries
The vocals make the song, although I really like the horns in the middle. Can't tell you how many times I've tried to reach the high notes with Eric Carmen when he sings "so BADDDD". No video.
"In Quintessence" by Squeeze
Three pieces of vinyl I had to replace with CDs when bought my first player was "Reckoning" by REM, "Sgt. Peppers" by The Beatles, and "Singles, 45s and Under" by Squeeze. This is just a great song. No video.
"So It Goes" by Nick Lowe
An entry from "Pure Pop for Now People" HAD to be included. Luckily a friend of mine converted this album from vinyl a few years ago. I'd have been lost without it. You can find most of it on "Basher: The Best of Nick Lowe", but there's nothing like hearing this song kick off an album. It can actually be considered a Rockpile song. Which leads me to...
"Teacher Teacher" by Rockpile
These guys could have been as big as CCR with a little more airplay. Take a listen.
"Whenever Your On My Mind" by Marshall Crenshaw
I played the crap out of this record in college. The drums are incredible. A guy on my floor saw him play at Mabel's in Champaign and said the drummer (who I think is Crenshaw's brother) played so hard he went thru at least a dozen pairs of drumsticks. Here it is.
"I'm in Line" by The Bangles
Unlike The Go-Go's, these girls can play! It's from their first EP. And this video is awesome!
"Every Word Means No" by Let's Active
I bought this EP when I first started listening to REM. Mitch Easter was producing their albums. And his stuff was great! I think I've heard this song play on the background of a couple of TV shows - "Friends" being one of them. Take a listen.
"Love Control" by Color Me Gone
The Wikipedia entry for Marti Jones does a better job of explaining the origins of this song and EP. I am so glad my friend transferred this from vinyl. It's quite a gem! No video.
"Throw It Away" by Joe Jackson
More of a rock piece than a pop song, but I just had to include it. And this is another album ("Look Sharp") that should be in everyone's collection! No video.
"There She Goes" by The La's
It's incredibly sad that this group could only put out one album, but I'm grateful that they did. This is by far the best version of this song. Almost hypnotic. Video.
"She's Electric" by Oasis
Is there anyone that doesn't have a copy of this album? It's easy to see why people compared them to The Beatles when it came out. Too bad they couldn't repeat it. Great stuff. Here's the video.
"Nice to Fit In" by Josh Rouse
A nice find thanks to The Loft on XM. I think I like this single best, but his best album is "Subtitulo." No video.
"Circle" by Swan Dive
Almost makes me think of a Burt Bacharach - Hal David song. Do yourself a favor: listen and watch this video!
"The Country Life" by The Bees (US)
If this song doesn't lift your spirits, you're dead. Here's the video.
"I'm Alright" by Owsley
This maybe the one cut that I wish I hadn't included in the mix. It's a good song, but it doesn't really fit. I like the album, and I know it won a Grammy, but it's just okay compared to the other stuff on the disc. But because it was from my "new" pile, I felt I had to include it. No video.
"This is Life?" by The Tories
This is a great song, but it's not one I find myself listening to a lot. Don't know why. Maybe that's why I included it here. No video.
"Built to Last" by Melee
If this song doesn't end up in a movie or TV show, it'd be a cryin' shame. This one will lead off my "Love Songs" mix whenever I get around to making it. Great vocals and very catchy. Take a listen.

The beautiful part of this mix is that it uses up all but 15-30 seconds of a disc - a huge plus for me! If anyone would like a free copy of it, just send me a note at ssminnow7 (at) gmail dot com. If the disc doesn't stay in your player for a week, I'll refund double your money :)

Hopefully this effort will be one of many future post. Only time will tell. If anything, there's always more music...

You Heard It Here First

2008-01-10T23:10:00.001-06:00

I'm really taking a big risk here. Hundreds of thousands of dollars - maybe millions - are at stake. All it takes is one opportunistic surfer to Google a few key words and he/she comes up with the idea of a lifetime. Something that could land a person at least a wikipedia entry and probably an reference on VH1's "I Love the Oughts" in 20 years, and quite possibly an address of One Easy Street Lane. But I haven't the patience to work the system, and I'm incredibly lazy (as seen by the long blog absense). And I have to get this off my chest before one of the other guys at work takes credit for it. Consider this post my bar napkin idea. Maybe it'll mean somthing in a court of law.

Picture this 30 second spot on a Thursday night show:

The scene opens on a city street outside a mechanic's garage. It's mid-day. The sun is shining brightly. The camera pans to the front door of the business. Cars on lifts, workers covered in grease, and customers reading year-old issues of Time magazine and Sports Illustrated. Mechanics and customers alike glance at the clock as it edges ever closer to Noon. Switch the scene to a corporate building. Workers are in their little cubicles, typing away at boring computer monitors, anxiously watching the clock as it inches closer to 12pm. Another scene is shown: two retired couples traveling down a city street in a Lincoln Continental (with the left hand turn signal on), glancing regularly at their watches and the clock in the car as it move within ticks of straight up 12:00. Then, in each of the scenes, the clock strikes noon.

Immediately, the folks in these settings begin to yell "Piiiiieeeeee!" like Ogre yelling "Neeeerrrrrdddds!" in "Revenge of the Nerds". Guys dropping tools, customers throwing down magazines, corporate folks rushing out of cubes, and old people in their cars - all yelling "Piiiiieeeeee!" They join others in the streets. Everyone is yelling "Piiiiieeeeee!" Then they all converges on Baker's Square, still yelling "Piiiieeeee!"

Then the voice of the announcer: "Come join us for Pie Day Friday™ tomorrow at Baker's Square."

Can't you just see "Piiiieeeee!" becoming as big as "Where's the beef?", "Whazzzup?", or "Dude!" Watercoolers will be buzzing! Blogs will be...blogging! And people will pile thru the doors in piepan-loads! This could be huge! For someone - just not me. But remember: you heard it here first.

BTW: I will be yelling "Piiiieeeeee!" on my way to a soup, salad and a slice of French Silk pie tomorrow at Baker's Square. Care to join me?

In Through the Out Door

2007-10-26T11:03:00.001-05:00

No, it's not a Led Zeppelin post. But their album provided the best title for this quick entry.

I had a colonoscopy last week.

Nothing but a screening. My brother Ronnie died from colon cancer 30 years ago this month at age 33. Since the age of 30, doctors have suggested that I have a screening because of family history. Like most people, volunteering for a 3 foot long tube with a camera to be shoved up your kiester was not how I wanted to spend a morning. Not to mention the colon prep activities the day before (Harry in Mary Swanson's bathroom from Dumb and Dumber comes to mind). But recent events have caused me to think a little more about my health and future. Plus Prudence and I met our insurance deductible for the year. So getting the colon flush and anal probe only cost me 10% of the total bill, which eased the pain in my...well, you know. It's also been a great source of jokes at work. One of my favorites was Rudiger creating an Outlook appointment on everyone's calendar entitled "Chris' First Colonoscopy". Location of the "meeting", you ask? In the butt, of course.

I'm happy to report that for the most part, everything was clean (or as clean as a colon can be). There were 2 small, pinhead-sized polyps that they were able to remove via a "cold snatch". The good news is that they don't need to see me for 5 years. The bad news is that I need to go back in 5. Actually, the procedure was not bad at all. The colon pre-treatment didn't keep me up all night like I thought it might. And I didn't walk out of the doctor's office like I'd been riding a horse all day :)

In the "end", a pretty successful day.

Dancing In Eternity

2007-10-24T00:08:00.001-05:00

In 1973, Dad had an exceptional year selling German farm equipment. So much so that he and a few others from the sales staff earned a 10-day trip to Germany to tour the plant and take in the beauty of Bavaria. The trip of a lifetime for a couple that loved to travel. The picture above was taken at one of their dinner events. Until recently, I never new my parents danced. But now its a picture I can't get out of my head. You see, my dad passed away almost 2 months ago.

It happened on a Sunday afternoon. Dad had his normal Sunday. He got up early and went to church with a couple that had faithfully taken him for the last 3 years. He went to Sunday School and voluntarily tried to read the scripture, although he wasn't able to finish because of his diabetic neuropathy. Afterwards, he made his 11am phone call to his best Marine Corp buddy Gus. Then he went to lunch and ate mostly watermelon - one of his favorites. Sunday afternoon was filled with Cardinal baseball and one of their few wins this season. At 4:45 or so he started to make his way to supper. Twenty feet outside his door, he had either a massive heart attack or stroke and was found slumped in his wheelchair a few minutes later by another resident headed to supper. Local EMTs (actually a nephew and his daughter - my cousins) arrived on the scene too late to do anything. They took him back to his room and laid him peacefully on his bed until the coroner arrived. Just like that, he was gone. While I knew it would happen eventually, I never thought about how or when this day would come. I do know that I had different plans for that day.

Dad had had a few incidents the week before with some of the people in charge of his care at the independent care facility he lived in. Several times in the past he had been reprimanded for traveling down the hallways of the center backward and endangering the safety of the other residents. Four times in a row that week he disregarded the requests of the administrator to ride down the hallway in his wheelchair going forward. Each time as soon as she turned her back, he turned around. At one of the meals he yelled at one of the staff in front of the other residents. He argued that they weren't changing his bed, or were stealing his sheets. And he stopped eating tomatoes - something he NEVER turned down. The staff supervisor noticed that his color was poor and asked him if he felt okay. He said he was fine. She later called and told us all that had been happening that week. Right then I knew that Dad was now beyond taking care of himself. We had talked earlier in the summer about possible new living arrangements (him moving closer to me) and it looked like that time was now. I took that Friday off work and visited a couple of the nursing home and assisted living centers in the area and prepared myself for "the talk" which I had in my mind would take place Sunday afternoon. But on Thursday I had a doctor's appointment in which we began changing my diabetes medicine. We upped my dosage of glyburide and my blood sugar level over the next 3 days was on a roller coaster ride. So when Sunday afternoon came around, I felt jittery and nauseous. I laid down after lunch to take a nap and figured that I'd call Dad after supper and tell him I'd be down to visit him later in the week. When I awoke, the kids asked if I wanted to go for a bike ride. I thought the fresh air would do us/me good so off we went. When we got back, Prudence grabbed my hand and ushered me into our bedroom. Oma (her mother) had been staying with us, and I figured there had been some sort of argument. It typically happens about 2-3 days into a stay. I couldn't have been further from the truth. That's when she hit me with the news from left field. The grief was overwhelming. And what made it even worse was that I'd missed the opportunity to talk with him one last time - all because of an upset tummy.

It's taken a while to come to grips with his passing. If any of you had been reading my entries over the last year, you know our relationship hadn't been what I'd liked it to be. Some of it was my fault. Some was his. But inthe last few months we had made some great strides in getting back to where we were 2 years prior - and possibly moving into new, uncharted waters. Just a few weeks before his death, he told me he loved me. It's something I've always known, but it was the first time I can remember hearing it. It was in response to the "tough love" talk I had with him a week earlier. You know the one that's normally broken out into several talks, except I lumped them all together. I had to tell him he couldn't drive out of town anymore, ask him to allow me to handle his finances (he had missed some bill payments), and suggest that he may need to leave his adopted hometown of 45 years and come live closer to me. In addition to all this, I broke the family rule and told him that I loved him. Now he was gone, and I'd never get to tell him I loved him or hear him say he loved me again.

But now as I look at it, I realize I'd been given a gift. I didn't have to throw away all the progress our relationship had made with fights over driving, money and moving. I don't live with the guilt that I most assuredly would have felt if I had made the trip that Sunday and laid out the grand plan to him only to have him pass after he heard the news. And I have a wonderful memory of Dad telling me that he loved me. Sure I miss him and I wish he were still here. But looking back, God had better things planned.

And speaking of God, I come back to the picture which opened this post. Ever since Mom passed in 2004, there's been a hole in Dad's heart that couldn't be filled by anyone but her. Now he's reunited with her in eternity. And they're dancing every day in His presence. I can't think of any better ending...or beginning.

Focus and Clarity

2007-07-25T21:03:00.000-05:00

Everyone and their brother has something to say about Harry Potter. You can't swing a dead computer mouse without hitting a news sight or blog (no offense CL, Fasty, or Christy) that talks about their love for the be-speckled sorcerer. And with good reason. JK Rowling spun an epic and entertaining tale that brought many back to papyrus.

But I think we've lost sight of the true hero of the summer: Jonathan. He brought focus and clarity to the Internet and a smile to our faces with his simple statement of affection for our special reptile friends who live in their shells - much to the chagrin of Denise (may or may not be her name), the Action Channel 8 news reporter covering his antics. How quickly we forget...

So, without further ado, I reintroduce to you (for the eleventy billionth time): Jonathan, the "I like turtles" boy!

I Promised Crap...

2007-07-15T12:26:00.001-05:00

...and I deliver!

Made of genuine cow manure from the Keystone State of Pennsylvania and sculpted by Amish dairy farmers, this poopet is perched on the binder bin above my desk. Even tho the odor was removed, it keeps all the texture of the original cow pie that spawned it - including straw and corn. It's eyes are soy beens. Normally you'd find him in a garden or lanscaping fertilizing the plants around him, but his job is much more important in my cube. He promotes interesting conversation, independent thought and scares dimwitted management away from my workspace.

Stay tuned for more "Things from Chris' desk"!

Quickie

2007-06-27T23:29:00.001-05:00

We're getting ready for our annual Fourth of July trip to Prudence's parents home in south central Michigan. We'll be gone a week. Outside of another 2 day trip to The Henry Ford (our membership - which was cheaper than buying 2 day passes the last time we went - expires 7/6 so we're gonna squeeze a couple more visits in), a whole lot of nothin' will be going on. We'll play pool (the billiards kind), fish, swim, and do some boating. We'll attend their small town Fourth celebration and parade - complete with 20-30 tractors, fire trucks, Shriners, horses (and their crap), 2 or 3 marching bands, and some quickly put together floats. The kids will actually ride in one sponsored by the Kiwanis group Pru's parents belong to. Looking forward to my mother in law's cooking - German potato salad, cucumber salad, asparagus, etc. - and eating a steak or 2 on the grill. When not doing family stuff, I plan to read, write a post or 2 (several things on my mind), FINALLY organize pictures from Hawaii, and spend some quality time with my beautiful wife. As I look at what I just typed, it doesn't look very relaxing. So I better build some sleep time in there as well. If anyone figures out how to get more than 24 hours out of a day, please let me know :)

But my intention tonight was not to sit down and give you an itinerary of my weekend. There's a quick story and picture I need to share. Sometime in the last couple of weeks, Weimie shared an embarrassing story about The Thing That Grew in the Garage Fridge. It made me think of a few food items in my desk at work that will soon be teenagers. Let me introduce you to... Banana, Orange, and Mustard Packets.

Banana is the oldest of the group. Back in the early 1990, when I could still show some restraint in my eating, I occasionally brought in some healthy snack choices. Banana was one of them. But apparently there must have been Hostess snack cakes in the vending machine that day and I forgot he was in my desk drawer. It wasn't until about a year later that I found him when I was moving to a new job within the company. He was in pretty much the same condition as you see him here. There may have been a faint odor to him, but you had to get close to smell it. Since it had lasted this long, and I have a penchant for novelty items like this, I decided to keep him wherever I went in the company. So here he is at age 12 (going on 13).

Orange's story is similar to B's. But he was created on purpose. A coworker who knew about banana "planted" O in my desk, and he wasn't found for 6-8 months later. He went thru some odd smells. At first he was rotten, then he became somewhat of a potpourri item. Ultimately he was left with no smell...which is good thing. He's about 10 years old. He gained a 1/2 brother (not pictured) about 8-9 years ago when someone else brought some rotting fruit to my desk. They could sense I had a soft spot for garbage.

Mustard Packets was given to me 3 years ago when I joined my current work group. One of the guys after hearing the story of Banana and Orange, brought out his own collection of expired condiment packets and asked that they join the menagerie in my desk. Who knows how old they are, but then again who cares? I kinda felt like a parent of 10 kids expecting number 11: what's another biohazard added to the mix?

So there you have it, Weims. The story of the rancid desk fruit. Sometime I'll have to share a picture of the crap (yes, literally CRAP) I have on my bookshelf...

I hope everyone has a fun and safe Fourth of July! See you in a week or so!

A Cry for Help

2007-06-20T16:59:00.000-05:00

You know you've got an eating problem when

You spend the last $8 in your pocket on as many 50 cent legs as it will buy.
You know that Zingers are a better deal than Ding Dongs by .25 oz in the vending machine.
You profess your love for salt.
To back up that love, you (on a dare) eat an entire salt packet straight (but vow to never do that again!)
To further cement that love, you dip fries in salt instead of ketchup.
To save you from a love gone wrong, your wife tapes shut 2/3 of the holes in the salt shaker from the inside with clear tape.
And you catch on after 2 meals.
You buy an entire roasted chicken at Sam's Club(for $5) and eat 2/3 for lunch because you don't like their regular menu.
You buy "value" boxes of Snickers (48/box) and Ding Dongs (24/box) from Sam's Club and keep them in your desk.
You eat a donut from a 11/12ths full box of donuts left BY (not in) the trash receptical on another floor at work.
You bring a 10 gallon Rubbermaid container to "Bring Your Own Container "day at the local movie theater and have it filled with popcorn for $.53…and don't even see a movie. Done at least 5 times.
You like your mashed potatoes with a very yellow, buttery tint.
You like to drink pickle juice and the leftover liquid from green beens, onions, and bacon grease.
You consider some foods as "vehicles" for condoments:

Tomatoes --> salt
French Fries --> salt
Bread --> butter
Lettuce --> ranch salad dressing
Corn on the Cob --> butter and salt
Crackers --> butter and salt

Special instructions: dip the cracker in a tub of butter, use your tongue to spread said butter uniformly, salt then eat.

You think that the pig is the perfect animal to eat.
You eat at KFC for the skin.

Added by the lunch crew (within 5 minutes of seeing the above list):

You get excited when certain people go to lunch with you that you know will not finish their meal, and they offer the rest to you.
You get excited at Wendy’s because they have bigger ketchup containers.
You call dibs on the Krispy Kreme box after it is empty of donuts to pick at the frosting stuck in the bottom of it.
You at 100 shrimp during Shrimp Fest at Red Lobster… for lunch.
You suspect you were the reason that the "all-you-can-eat" soup bars in town are no longer "all-you-can-eat".
You post the rules and records for the IFOCE (Internation Federation of Competitive Eating) outside your cube.
You consider a sleeve of Girl Scout cookies one serving.
You were miserable eating 3 big slices of pizza, yet still found room for an ice cream cone.
You email Hardees to thank them when they went back to promoting burgers.
You frequent McDonalds enough to feel obligated to give the help Christmas gift cards.

To quote the Captain from The Simpsons: "He's more beast than man".

I guess the first step in recovery is admitting you have a problem…

Awesome Dad

2007-06-17T10:54:00.000-05:00

Today our pastor shared the story and video below of Dick Hoyt and his son, Richard Jr. Their story can be found on their website: http://www.teamhoyt.com/. MSN is also featuring a tribute from Richard Jr. to his dad. It was just too moving not to share. Be prepared - you'll need Kleenex!

Have a great Father's Day!

"I collect spores, mold and fungus..."

2007-06-12T21:59:00.000-05:00

I fully expected to match Burl Ives at about 80-90%, but I am a big Harold Ramis fan. Thanks again to Aynde!

"A-B-C! It's Easy as 1-2-3!"

2007-06-12T18:34:00.000-05:00

Thank goodness Aynde tagged me on this. I've wanted to post something since last week but everything I wanted to write about would take long to compose. Uggh! I wish I could write something without it becoming "War and Peace" in my head. This was short and fun!

So here you have my ABCs. Can't ever say that without thinking of the Jackson 5. Hope it's in your head just like it's in mine :)

A - Attached or single? Attached. To Prudence for 19 years. She's my better 9/10ths...

B - Best friend? Prudence.

C - Cake or pie? Do I have to choose? Well, since there's no gun to my head, it's Panda's Cherry Pie and Mom's Chocolate Cake.

D - Drink of choice? Diet Pepsi, but I hate this choice. Rather have the leaded stuff, but my pancreas has other ideas.

E - Essential item? TV. Or radio.

F - Favorite color? Again, no gun: Orange and Blue!

G - Gummi bears or worms? Bears, but I prefer my candy in bars with lots of chocolate.

H - Hometown? An Native American named town south of Decatur in Central Illinois that means "Muddy Water". Just hate to name it because of search engines. It's the "one and only"!

I - Indulgence? It's like the Academy Awards: I feel like I'd be leaving someone out. But if I HAD name the top 3 (via said gun): gyros, Edy's Double Chocolate Fudge ice cream, and Hostess Ding Dongs.

J – Jail, Been There? Nope, but I was scared straight as a 4th grader on a visit to our county pokey.

K - Kids? 3 - Panda, The Boy, and Em.

L - Life is incomplete without? Prudence.

M - Marriage date? June 4th.

N - Number of siblings? 1 sister and 2 brothers - all at least 16 years older than me, so at times they're more like aunts and uncles.

O - Oranges or apples? Oranges. And they're best in juice form.

P - Phobia/fears? Ventriloquist dummies.

Q - Favorite quote? Almost every line in Stripes, Dumb and Dumber and O Brother Where Art Thou.

R - Reasons to smile? Too many to name. I like to smile A LOT!

S - Season? Summer - baseball, swimming, vacation, shorts...

T - Tag three. Bill, Weimie, and Jean. But anyone should feel free to do it.

U - Unknown fact about me? I was the valedictorian of my class...of 62 people. But we all rode the short bus.

V - Vegetarian or oppressor of animals? You can eat stuff from plants? Oppressor of Animals, of course! Reminds me to write an ode to the pig.

W - Worst habit? Cleaning my kid's plates. It's easily added 20lbs to my frame...

X - X-rays or ultrasounds?? X-Rays. Never been pregnant.

Y – Can you Yo-Yo? Used to Yo-Yo, but now? No-no.

Z - Zodiac? "It's the age of …"

"Goin' to the Chapel..." - 19 year later!

2007-06-04T17:45:00.000-05:00

Taking a page from The Librarian's blog and reposting and entry from my Spaces blog.

Prudence and I celebrated our anniversary yesterday with a movie (Spider-man 3) and dinner (Fiesta Ranchera). No Zorba's this weekend - trying to watch our milage these days. Panda watched her brother and sister...and no one was killed. All-in-all, it was a success! Tonight we get to celebrate on our new memory foam mattress topper :) Happy Anniversary, Honey!!!

And while digging this one up, I re-read the comments and remembered that you can stop by and congratulate Christy and Cowboy on their anniversary as well!

Memories related to our 6/4/1988 wedding date:

The month prior to the wedding saw me receive my first 2 speeding tickets. The first happened while heading down to my hometown to solidify some arrangements. I was the last in a line of people speeding – and the easiest to nab. The second happened the Thursday before the wedding on Saturday. Prudence was to deliver some sheet music to our new vocalist (the other came up with laryngitis), but she forgot. So she asked me to run the errand. I was in a hurry to drop off the music and pick up pizza (Godfathers – our favorite at the time) and went 40 in a 30. I tried to weasel out of the ticket – tried to use the “I’m getting married this weekend and going to drive on my honeymoon” in order to keep my license, but it didn’t work. Probably should have shown some leg or something…
No wedding planner, so Prudence and I came up with the wedding program/scorebook. I listed her sister as the “Matron of honor” because I thought that sounded more formal. I later found out it meant that the “maid of honor” was married. Which she wasn’t. I still take grief about that from time to time.
I was okay until about 10 minutes before the ceremony when I started to freak out at the whole commitment thing – the rest of my life with this woman? Pacing frantically in the alcove at the front of the sanctuary. Speaking in loud and hurried speech. The minister (who was also a very good friend of mine) settled me down enough to get me out on the stage. As the bridesmaids came down the isle, I started to calm down. Then when Prudence and her dad began their walk, my heart immediately went calm. It was like no one else was there. Only her. And that was a cool as it gets.
During the lighting of the unity candle, Prudence and I had some time to talk quietly – just between us. Many people have asked us what we were talking about. That’s our little secret.
After the wedding, we had a dinner (or was it supper?). Because I insisted in the tradition of not seeing the bride before the wedding, we took all our pictures after the ceremony. So we were late to our own dinner, and most people had finished by the time we got there. I’ll regret that as long as I live.
My grandparents from Iowa were able to make it to the wedding. We had a number of great pictures taken of and with them. The next year, on my birthday, my grandfather died of a heart attack. Our pictures are the only professional pictures of him left, and I’ll be forever thankful of that.
My sky-blue 1979 Cutlass was covered in Oreo cookies when we left the church. Most of them stayed on during our drive to Chicago for our wedding night at a Days Inn off Halstead Avenue. We washed them off the next morning.
My car had been in an accident before the wedding and still had a can of paint left in the drunk from the paint job. I forgot to take it out before we left. Somewhere along the line it tipped over and drained out below the rear quarter panel and onto the hotel parking lot. We drive by the hotel every once in a while on our way to Michigan to visit her parents and I think of this every time.
We went to Niagara Falls for our honeymoon (again, the traditionalist in me). About 30 miles from the Falls, my radiator went out. We nursed the car into town and had to make arrangements to get it fixed. The concierge at the hotel got a case of his favorite beer.
We were on our honeymoon for 10 days and only stayed consecutive nights in the same hotel once. This drove Prudence crazy. To get back at me, she spilled something on the floor in every room we stayed at. This has become an inside joke for us when we travel.
We also visited Boston, the Cape, and NYC on our honeymoon.
The Cards played the Mets at Shea Stadium on Monday, June 13th. We had planned to leave for home on Monday but I talked her into staying one extra day for the game. Romantic, aren’t I? The only catch is that we would have to drive straight home after the game. The game went into extra innings and we left NYC at Midnight. We had NO IDEA how to get out of the city. Unfortunately we took a wrong exit off a bridge and ended up in a questionable part of the city with only a few working stoplights and streetlights. We pulled up to one red light and heard what we thought were gunshots down the road to our right. So I went thru the light. At the next light, we came across a truck stopped in the middle of the intersection. The driver’s door was open, the engine was still running and no driver to be found. I ran thru this light, too. We finally found a truck route sign and followed it out of “Mr. Robinson’s Neighborhood”.
I drove until 5am and got us to somewhere in PA on the turnpike. I asked Prudence, who had been sleeping the entire way, to drive for me while I caught some Zs in the back seat. When I woke up 4 hours later, we were stopped along side the road in a rest area and a cop was walking away from our car. She’d become too sleepy to drive and had pulled over to rest. From 5am to 9am, we traveled only 75 miles. The rest of the way home we took turns driving 1-2 hours at a time. We haven’t attempted a straight-thru drive since.
We paid so many tolls on our drive home that on our first night at home, I rolled over in the middle of the night and asked Prudence for toll money.
Sometime later in the week after we returned home, Prudence woke me up in the middle of the night to let me know that she heard something outside (we slept with our windows open for a breeze) and was worried a woman was in trouble. Not wanting to be bothered but still concerned with the woman’s welfare, I told her to call the police. After she got off the phone, I finally woke up enough to hear what she was worried about. The woman was not in trouble. She was definitely “enjoying herself” and her time with a guy named Mike in an apartment 2 floors up. When the police arrived, I told them what my wife heard (that was strange to say at the time!) and that they probably didn’t need to investigate any further. But because they just can’t take my word for it, they paid a visit to the couple in 3B. Shortly after the cops left, I heard the woman laughing louder than I’ve ever heard anyone laugh before – including me. Dare I say that Prudence then challenged me to “be like Mike”?

Happy Anniversary, Prudence! I love you!

So when do I get my mane?

2007-06-02T22:26:00.001-05:00

"I'm rather proud of my mane of ... hair."
Ron Burgendy

No, not THAT mane! (Although it is the first thing I think about when I hear the word - it's one of the most hilarious scenes in Anchorman.) I'm talkin' about the kind that whips around when driving in a convertible. The kind that demands a hair dryer, makes you go to a beautician vs a barber, and that makes guys who have one think mullets are a good look.

Most of you know that my hair started abandoning me sometime in the late 80s. I can't remember if I told this story before, but the first time I realized I had a bald spot was in a mirrored elevator in New Orleans in 1993. Beginning in 1999 I stopped going to someone else to get my hair cut and bought a set of clippers.

Even though it sounds like I'm bitter, really I'm not. About the only time I thought that my hair was something that helped "define me" was in high school. But like most kids of that age, image is everything. College and real life changed that. The thing I miss most about my hair is that I no longer have a cushion between my scalp and my baseball hats. I wear them all the time - especially when I work outside - and they all start reaking after a couple of months of sweat. If someone has a solution to this problem, I'd love to hear it. Then I'd be totally satisfied with my melon. Other than that, I use less shampoo & conditioner, don't have to use a hair dryer, and can cut it myself. What could be better for a guy that hates maintenance? But apparently I hadn't made this clear to my bride...

Over the last year or so, Prudence has been using a hair product recommended by her beautician to help control and possibly reverse some hair thinning she's experienced. But she's been unhappy with the results. So she began investigating other options and ran across this one in our own back yard (per se). It's called Resthairation and it was recently written up in our local paper. After researching the product (it's developed by a hairdresser with all-natural herbs and has a full money back guarantee, which are huge pluses for her), she thought she'd give it a try. Then they presented her with a special deal for the man of the house. She'd probably heard me joke one too many times about my hairless noggin, and possibly saw this testimonial (which is freakeshly similar to my condition) and decided I should give it a try. So she laid the new scalp care regiment on me:

Use the new shampoo
Leave it on for 5 minutes
Use the new conditioner
After drying off, reapply the new conditioner and leave it on to soak into the scalp
Apply another "coat" before bedtime

My first reaction was, "you gotta be kidding me!" Going from something just above bar soap to multiple applications of an herbal-based, home-made concoction not mass-produced by Johnson & Johnson©? And since when does my sensible wife buy into infomercial-type advertising? But then she gave me the look that says "do it for me" (not to mention the price tag - YOUCH!) and I caved.

Before I go any further, I need to point out that this isn't about Prudence wanting a new man. She's perfectly content with the balding, middle-aged guy she's promised to cohabitate with for the rest of her life. She only has my best interest at heart. Or so she says :) Anywho...

Once she finished her spiel, I went to take a shower. I'd worked a long afternoon in the yard at the duplex (which may be a post for another day) and really stunk it up. I told Prudence to take a good look at me - it might be the last time she'd see me like this. I might come out with a flowing mane like Homer Simpson on Dimoxonil. After dodging her right hook, I started my shower. Here are some of the thoughts that went thru my head that night and ever since:

Need to use less than a dime shape's worth of shampoo and conditioner (did I mention that this stuff costs a lot of money?)
Is there a coin smaller than a dime (again, I'm cheap)
The shampoo smells Lestoil-ish
What if I end up looking like Fabio?
I have to leave this stuff on for 5 minutes. What am I going to do in the shower for 5 minutes (since I'm no longer 13 or single)?
Hey, this stuff is running down my neck and face. I don't need any more ear and nose hair. What other hair will I get? Unibrow? Apeman?
Has anything come in yet?

So 3 weeks later, I'm waiting for my mane. Just the other day Prudence noticed a long, extremely thin hair and wanted to pluck it out. What? I thought this is what we were working for. Then she said, "it's on your nose". Sure enough, a white hair about an inch long was there on the tip of my shnoz - visible only at certain angles. Suck.

If this is where it's headed, I want my bar of soap back...

Bark At You Later

2007-05-31T23:03:00.001-05:00

Every morning before work I take the dog for a walk around the neighborhood. At the very least we go around the block. Most days we make a loop around the grounds of the church we attend about a block away. He hunts for critters and "marks" his usual spots. He drags me around to the point that I could practically live at the chiropractor's office. But what he really lives for is for barking at Jake.

Jake is a 15 year old yellow lab (that's 105 to you and me) that lives in a 20'x20' chain link fenced area in his owner's backyard. The yard backs up to one of the roads Lance and I walk down every morning. During the winter, his owners keep him in their garage. He starts staying out in the yard over night once the weather gets nice. Being an old dog, Jake doesn't move around much. When he does, its much like Tim Conway's Old Man character from the Carol Burnett Show. Unless he sees or hears Lance. Then he forgets any aches and pains he might have and starts lunging and barking in our general direction. Lance returns the action with a fierce bark and a quick pull on his lead that almost says "let me at 'im". After 3-5 good deep barks, Jake starts hacking up a lung and quietly strolls back to his shelter and Lance returns to his standard sniffing and peeing. This happens on every walk - almost like clockwork. The only thing that varies is who initiates the jawing. Sometimes Jake is walking in his yard and spots Lance first, but most of the time its Lance that starts stalking him about 30-40 yards away. His ears perk up and he starts getting a prance to his stride. When he hits the road, he starts jumping and barking, trying to catch Jake off guard. Secretly, I think he's trying to give him a heart attack. I'd feel awful if that happened, so I'm going to pretend I didn't say that. Anyway, today was different.

Lance and I started down the sidewalk like any other day. He saw his foe and began his stalking moves. Ears up. High stepping all the way. Jake had his back to us walking his yard. Perfect! Lance begins to pick up his steps. I prepare for my arm to be pulled out of its socket. And then it happens. Something I don't remember ever seeing, but I'm sure it happens every day. Jake squats to take a dump. And Lance pauses. Out of respect or out of awe (it was a BIG pile!), I couldn't say. But he stopped dead in his tracks and just waited. And waited. And waited. It seemed like an eternity, but I'm sure it was only 5-10 seconds. However long it was, it was too long for Lance. He just turned and headed the other way. Jake never saw us. Maybe he pushed so hard he blinded himself. Whatever it was, there was no barking today.

But at least Jake will live to bark another day.

Mom Memories

2007-05-12T23:18:00.001-05:00

As I sit here on the eve of Mother's Day, I thought I'd share some memories about my mom.

As a little shaver on a snowy day, Mom would pull me around our block on my sled.
On rainy summer days with big mud puddles and rain-filled ditches, she'd let me ride and play outside without getting too mad.
In 2nd or 3rd grade, our school (K-12 in one building) celebrated homecoming with a box decorating contest. The boxes looked like miniature parade floats and symbolized our victory over the hated Ironmen. I, like many kids, told Mom about the contest way later than I should have. But that didn't faze her. Drawing from life experience, she came up with an idea of hanging the Ironmen "out to dry" and helped me build a clothesline on a football field with the team's name hanging on it. Aw, who am I kidding, she did 95% of it. And it came in 2nd place.
Mom, instead of Dad, taught me to mow. She later helped me get mowing jobs around town and would usually help me by trimming around trees and landscaping.
During the summer months, Mom (and my sister - 22 years my senior) took me and my cousins to see about every Disney film. "The World's Greatest Athlete" and "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" stick out as favorites.
Mom made the best beef noodles in the world. Thankfully, Prudence studied her "pinch of this" and "dab of that" method of cooking it to the point that her's taste just like Mom's. Can't thank her enough. Panda's learning to make it now.
In the 2nd grade I was diagnosed with a lazy eye. The doctor gave Mom a set of eye exercises to work thru with me. He didn't think she'd stick with it, but 6 months later I was glasses-free. And I remained so until my freshman year of college.
Every morning thru high school, mom would wake me up at 7:10 and tell me it was 7:15, knowing that I wouldn't get up until the second call. Then as I made my way to the breakfast table with my eyes shut like a mole, she'd greet me with "Good morning, Sunshine!"
When she made my lunch for school, she always made a ham sandwich (cut in half - rectangularly), a bag of chips, and a Ding Dong.
During the first semester of my sophomore year at college, I found it easier to goof around with friends than do my schoolwork. After a month into the semester, I felt like there was no way I could catch up and considered dropping out. Mom (and Dad) drove to Champaign, took me out for Godfather's Pizza, talked me down from the ledge lovingly, and helped me get focused to catch up.
The year that we considered Mom might be in the beginning stages of Alzheimer's was the year that Prudence and I were expecting our first child. To announce the blessed event-to-be, we took advantage of a visit from her parents to have all the future grandparents over for supper. We made place cards for the dining room table with titles like "Grandma W" or "Oma P". Because we often joked that our dog was our kid, almost everyone thought we were making references to him. But Mom, the one that was the most confused of all of us, was clear for that meal and realized immediately what the place cards meant and ran to give Prudence and I a hug. A moment I'll never forget.
Most of the memories beyond that point aren't as pleasant, but I do remember the last smile she gave me on a visit to her in the nursing home. It was about 2 years before she died.

I love you, Mom. Happy Mother's Day.

My Current Musical Obsession

2007-04-27T00:40:00.001-05:00

I've been listening to Fountains of Wayne for years and I think they're fabulous!

Actually, I haven't. I've only been listening to them for 2 months, but it feels like much longer. And it may be more like 10 years. Let me explain...

This past Christmas I received a $30 gift card for Rhapsody's music service for some downloads. In order to use the service, I had to sign up for their basic account, which includes 25 free plays from their website each month. Being somewhat of a "techno-pi-rate", I've been using some specialized audio software in conjunction with the free plays to complete some music collections (in January I recorded my favorite Partridge Family songs and created my own greatest hits compilation) and try out some new music. While going thru some computer files, I ran across a WMV version of "Stacy's Mom" video someone sent me when it came out - before the advent of YouTube. Back then, I probably listened to it for 2-3 days straight. The tune was so catchy and hilarious - not to mention Rachel Hunters performance. But I wrote FoW (how REAL fans refer to them) off as a one hit wonders and never checked out any of their other recordings. Big mistake. So when I saw the file, I made a mental note-to-self to check them out in March.

Late one night in February after a long day of snow blowing, I recorded "Welcome Interstate Managers" to my Zen for work the next day. I then preceded to listened to it for 3 days straight! Every song on the album is a hit, but my favorites are "Hey Julie" (one of my favorite love songs) and "All Kinds of Time" (with song lyrics based on football play-by-play). I started researching their other albums and found out they'd been together since 1996! How did a band this great fly under the radar for so long? Fortunately I'd found them with a pretty good catalog of music - 3 other albums (one being a 2 album set) and one coming out soon (April 3rd). I had enough free plays to make my own copy of one of their first 2 albums, but I'd have to buy the other 2. Or wait for the next 2-3 months to compile enough free plays for the other albums.

Interlude... I don't make it a habit of recording music this way. Normally, if I like a artist/group, I'll buy their stuff. It just so happens that I need to keep inexpensive gift giving options available to the wife and kids. Father's day is coming up...but I couldn't wait until June! So I recorded what I could until I get originals in my hand. Now back to the story.

So I recorded "Utopia Parkway" - with my favorite song of theirs, "Red Dragon Tattoo" - before our trip and bought a copy of "Out-of-State Plates" - which has one of the funniest songs I've heard in "Maureen" and a song I can relate to in "Baby I've Changed". When we got back, my free plays had reset and I recorded their debut "Fountains of Wayne". By then it was April 3rd and "Traffic and Weather" was available, so I bought it.

Now I had all 86 tracks of their published music. But that still wasn't enough. While obsessing about the group one day while Googling, I saw that FoW made an appearance on an NPR program and that the good people of NPR were making the audio available with the click of a button. You know what that meant: more recording. Then I saw that they would be hosting an XM Loft Session. 45 minutes more of acoustic Adam and Chris - the brains behind the group. Further searches turn up nothing more. So I think that I have all I can get...for now.

With only a couple of exceptions - in my car and at home - this is all that I've been listening to. It's not the first time it's happened to me. Other artists and/or groups to have been the object of my obsession are: Elvis Costello, Squeeze (both of which were referenced by FoW during their Loft Session - a huge plus), The Police, REM, Bob Marley, The Bangles, Steely Dan, The Guess Who, Bruce Springsteen, and of course, The Beatles. They're in pretty good company in my opinion.

If you feel inclined to check them out beyond "Stacy's Mom", I'd suggest you listen to "Welcome Interstate Managers" first. Its loaded with great music that will appeal to a wide audience. If you want to hear more of their guitar work, move on to "Utopia Parkway" or their self-titled album. If you want more evolved sounds, take a listen to their newest, "Traffic and Weather". Many of the people who have been with them from the beginning are disappointed by their last 2 efforts because they feel they've abandoned their roots of solid guitar pop. And to some extent they may be right. But would they rather have had The Beatles stay in the "Love Me Do" phase and never create "Sgt. Peppers" or "Abbey Road"? Or how about Bob Dylan sticking with "Baby Let Me Follow You Down" (which is a great song!) and never see him record "Tangled Up in Blue" (my personal favorite of his)? And I suppose REM was to continue "Murmur"-ing and never go "Out of Time". I don't think so. So don't listen to early fans that want things to stay the same. Both of these efforts are great. And so is their earlier work. Try it all. Who knows, maybe you'll obsess over them, too...

And I didn't forget my 10 years ago reference. Does anyone remember "That Thing You Do" - the movie written and directed by Tom Hanks? It followed the short career of a fictitious 1960s one-hit-wonder group called The Wonders and their hit "That Thing You Do". Even thou I didn't see the movie until 2 years after it had come out, I owned a copy of the soundtrack based on the title track shortly after it came out. The title track was so infectious! During my research on FoW, I found that Adam Schlesinger, one of FoW's primary songwriters, wrote the song. So, to some extent, I HAVE been listening to them for years...and I think their FABULOUS!

Life Lessons

2007-04-20T23:02:00.001-05:00

Among the toys The Boy received for Christmas this year was the Lego version of Darth Vader's Tie Fighter. He's only seen each movie once or twice (except for Episode III, which he hasn't seen yet - not sure his sister could handle the ending) but is totally plugged in to the mythos. Playing hours of Lego Star Wars on the Playstation 2 nurtured it, but building his own ship just cemented his love for the saga. And made him thirsty for more. For his birthday, he asked for and received the Lego versions of the X-Wing fighter and General Grievous' starfighter. But in between then, he lobbied to buy an Imperial AT ST with his own hard earned can-crushing money.

We tried to dissuade him, citing all the toys he had just received at Christmas and the gifts he was sure to receive for his birthday in March. Even if he didn't receive it from us, he might from one of his aunts or uncles. I also explained to him that if he bought it, he'd wipe out nearly all the money he had saved up to that point. If he spent it, he'd have to save longer for purchases like the laser dart tag and Lego Star Wars II video game that he'd been talking about longer than the Lego model. Words like these seemed to fall from my mouth much too easy. With good reason. They were the same ones my dad would use on me time and time again when I had money burning a hole in my pocket. Now I know that he was trying to build a good financial decision foundation in his son. But back then I resented it. It seemed he brought it up with every purchase I wanted to make, to the point that I rarely bought anything and spent Saturday mornings counting quarters ($.75/week allowance) like King Midas. This lasted until college when I had my own job and cheap access to used records. But that's a story for another day. I promised myself that I would never use those words to manipulate (which is what I thought happened to me) - only to educate. So when I heard myself begin Dad's diatribe, I changed it to become a dialoge. After explaining the principles of "which do you want more", I asked him if he understood and never brought it up again. It seemed to work until we got back from vacation and he saw the girls celebrating their birthdays with gifts. The "can I buy it now?" question resurfaced. Busy-ness during the month of April has prevented us from getting together with my sister and her family for gift exchanges, so we were still able to use the soon-to-be gift excuse to hold him off.

Fast forward to today. Prudence left at noon to attend a women's retreat with some other moms, which left me in sole charge of the kids. Friday afternoons, The Boy and Em attend a gym and swim program at the local YMCA, so I took time off work to take them. On the way, The Boy asked me if we could go to Walmart so he could buy the AT ST. I reminded him that we would get together in the next couple of weeks for more gift exchanges. He informed me that he now wanted to create an army of AT STs, and that buying one before he received one from his aunt would work out in his plan. After making sure of this, I agreed to let him buy one. So he counted out his $22 (made up mostly of $1 bills and quarters), put it in a zip lock bag, and tucked it away in his backpack. After gym and swim, we visited the Walmart where he last saw one. They were out. Luckily, there is another Walmart within a few miles (almost becoming like Starbucks in this part of the country). They were out as well. I told him we would try Target and Toys R Us. If they didn't have one, he wasn't meant to have one. But when we arrived at Target, they had 2. He took one to the cashier and gave her 2 fists of money - bills in one hand, metal in the other. She didn't even count the quarters - she just took my word for it (yes, I did recount it!) and gave him his receipt. After all the waiting and work it took to get the goods, I expected to see a "bouncy Tigger" with a big grin on his face. But he simply took the bag and left the store.

Five minutes down the road, I heard him say something that will stay with me the rest of my life: "I thought I'd be happier, but I just feel empty." I asked him what he meant by that. He said he expected the toy to bring joy, but he didn't feel any. Even though he couldn't verbalize it, it wasn't that he didn't want the toy. He just wasn't sure that this was the right time or way to get it. I believe he also realized that he didn't really buy the "army of AT STs" rationalization he'd sold himself earlier. We talked about the idea that everything we do/give/receive comes as a cost. And that we have to weight that cost. He asked me if the choice he'd made to buy the toy was a good one. I told him only he could make that decision. But I asked him to think about it overnight before opening the box - just in case he wanted to return it. He asked me how much Lego Star Wars II cost. When I told him he went silent for a few minutes. Trust me, this is rare for him. He just stared at the box. After a while he asked if it would be okay to wait to build the AT ST until after we saw his aunt. "Not a problem, buddy." Then he wished he had a good hiding place for the toy. I told him I'd take care of it. After all this, he seemed to be at peace with the decision. Only once later in the night did he come to me with a request to open the box (while it was still out on the counter), but he stopped himself in mid-sentence. He realized he was being tempted to go back on his agreement, and overcame it.

Sometimes the best lessons are learned when you're not in school. My dad would be so proud.

Back to Reality

2007-04-02T23:00:00.001-05:00

When our plane touched down at 5:30am on Friday and it taxied to our gate, I knew what our stewardess was going to say...and I dreaded it. It's the same phrase you hear at the end of every flight: "We know you have a choice in airlines, and we thank you for choosing United". But this one would be special. Not only would it signal the end to our trip to Paradise, but it would also be punctuated with a word I'm sure not to hear any time soon on the mainland: Mahalo, the Hawaiian word for "thank you". It's the one native word I had managed to work into my vocabulary, and this was the last opportunity to hear it and use it. In a matter of moments, I would be back in Chicago listening to everyone talk like a member of the Superfans ("tanks!", "what haive you", "over by der", etc.). Not something I was ready to go back to. But it happened. She said "Mahalo" and I returned the phrase as I left. We walked the gangway and were back to light jackets and jeans, fast-paced walking, and surely cab drivers. The dream was over and it was back to reality.

Here are a few notes from the trip:

Our flight there was great. We were worried about how we would entertain the kids for 9 hours in a confined space, but thanks to in-flight movies ("Happy Feet" and "Night at the Museum"), my brother-in-law's portable DVD player (with spare battery), and the fascination with airplane bathrooms, we made it without a hitch. I listened to an hour of my audiobook, "1776", watched the above movies (plus "Casino Royale"), and took a short nap. We were there before we knew it.
We stayed at the Sheraton Waikiki on Oahu. I woke up at 3:30am the first night there and couldn't go back to sleep. So I went for a drive up to Diamondhead and watched the sunrise. Pretty cool. And I made it back to join the family for a tremendous "everything" omelette (including spam and shrimp) at the Seaside Cafe!
The kids, Prudence, and her sister swam with dolphins at the Sea Life Park. I'm just glad The Boy didn't stick his finger in the blow hole.
We played on an incredible white sandy beach in Lanikai with some great snorkeling and a view of 2 small islands off shore. Very picturesque.
We endured a long drive and day at the Polynesian Cultural Center. Don't get me wrong - there were some cool things to see and learn there, but at 5-6 hours with kids was too long. And I'm not sure how many times rednecks from Illinois can watch natives stomp, clap, and hula. To top it off, my brother in law had a bout of "Hawaiian revenge" from some Chinese food he ate at lunch.
We couldn't visit Hawaii without a trip to the USS Arizona memorial. What a moving experience. We also toured the USS Bowfin and USS Missouri.
Our family visited 3 beaches on the North Shore. Lots of surfing. None by me. I'd end up eating a rock like Greg Brady. But we did climb around some cool tide pools with water so clear it was like looking thru glass.
On Monday we left for Maui. We spent the entire afternoon in Lahaina. They had a local craft show that took a lot of our souvenir money. Prudence ended up with a jewelry box made of koa wood, inlayed with shell in the color and shape of turtles. We also bought Christmas ornaments made of koa and shells for the kids. I bought a surfer-type necklace that features blue coral. Panda also chose a necklace. Em wanted dolphin earrings. And The Boy picked a men's jewelry box for his shark tooth necklace. I also bought my Hawaiian shirt there, as well as an orange & blue Maui cap. I paid $10 for the cap, then wandered down 2 stores and found it for $7. Later in the week I found the same hat in a K-Mart for $5. So I bought another one.
Tuesday found us whale watching. On the way to the whale tour, Prudence spotted a momma and calf just north of Lahaina, so we pulled over to watch them swim and play. As they moved down the coast, we followed them. After a quick bite at Peggy Sue's (thanks for the tip, Aynde! The kids especially liked the juke box that played real 45s!), we set out on our tour and met up with another mom/calf pair. These 2 were flanked by a primary and secondary male escorts, so we got to see and hear a lot of whale pick up lines. Nothing seemed to work for the poor guys, but it kept the trip at a G or PG rating.
Tuesday night was our luau at the Old Lahaina Luau. Great setting and show. Good food - if you like Hawaiian food.
Wednesday we woke up at 3am to make the trek to the top of Haleakala to see the sunrise from above the clouds. it's a 2+ hour and -50 degree trip from our condo. When we arrived it was 36 degrees. The Boy did nothing but complain until the sun came up. But it was a breathtaking site. The trip back down the mountain was just as impressive. So many incredible views.
Our last beach run was to Kapalua. The cove we swam in had righteous waves. The surfers could ride them easily to shore. The kids enjoyed body surfing and jumping into the waves, but they knocked Prudence on her butt. To top it off, we had another whale show. This time a calf breeched (jumped out of the water) at least 4-5 times. Incredible!
Thursday we began the journey back at 7:30am (actually Prudence and I were up at 5:30am). We flew to Oahu to catch our flight home, but had a 5 hour layover there. So we rented a couple of cars and drove the 10 minutes back to the Pearl Harbor sites where the kids could expend some energy before the long flight home. With the time change, we arrived in Chicago at 5:30am. But we still had a long drive back to the Bloomington area. After picking up Lance (freshly groomed!), we arrived back at our house at 11:30am. The end to a LONG day.

Much sleep ensued on Friday and Saturday. And after avoiding a cold before and during the trip, I finally came down with a bit of a head cold on Sunday. Lance really brought us back to reality this morning. Beginning at 2:30am, he woke us up every hour or so with a bad case of diarrhea. Unfortunately we all had to leave the house this morning, so he left us a lovely mess to clean up when we came home. Yup, the vacation is truly over.

Pictures will be coming soon. You thought I wrote a lot. I need to weed thru almost 6GB of data to pull out the keepers from all the thumb shots. Plus I need to get my taxes done. The reality just keeps coming...

Finally...the end to a Forgettable Season and Other Stuff

2007-03-17T03:12:00.001-05:00

Chester Frazier, Rich McBride, Warren Carter, Shaun Pruitt, and Brian Randle. Anyone other than those living in a 75 mile radius of Champaign-Urbana know who these 5 are?

Didn't think so.

But these were the players leading the Fighting Illini to one of the most forgettable seasons in recent memory. No pro talents. No incredible athletes or phenoms. No great stories (such as walk-on to team captain, star graduating in 3 years but staying for championship run, etc.). Just a group of B-grade talent that journeyed themselves to the middle of the Big Ten standings (which outside of Ohio State and Wisconsin, was mediocre at best). Many said that 2 wins in the Big Ten tournament would guarantee them a spot in the Big Dance. They did just that, then fell incredibly flat against Wisconsin. The experts classified them as a bubble team that got lucky theirs didn't burst. This angered some in Illini nation. "We play in the Big Ten! We played the #1 and #2 teams in the nation pretty tight! We beat Indiana twice! Blah, blah, blah..." I've never heard such "homer" talk from this group. Didn't they see them play this year? Sure, they could play tenacious D (speaking of which, did anyone see this movie?), but holding opponents to 40% shooting only works when you shoot much better than they do. They had no ball handling skills and gave up possessions like a politician handing out handshakes. Their decision-making on the court was brutal (I remember during the first meeting with Indiana Bruce Weber yelling at Chester not to foul as Chester body-checked one of the Indiana guards into the scorer's bench.) And I haven't even touched on free throw shooting, but no one works on their free throws anymore. No, this team was NIT worthy at best. But someone fell in love with their RPI rating and the idea that a Illinois-Southern Illinois (Weber's old school coached by one of his former assistants) could be a great story if it happened. It got many worked up into a lather - especially when they had a 13 point lead with 8 minutes left against #5 seed Virginia Tech. Even I couldn't believe it. Had they been saving themselves for this moment? But then as I watched them score only 5 points in the last fifth of the game and turn the ball over 10 times, I remembered why I guarded my heart with this group. Final score: Virginia Tech 54, Illinois 52. Was I pissed? You bet! Did it last long. Nope.

Unfortunately, Illini fans have nothing to look forward to. No talent sitting on the bench and no blue chippers coming our way (but I DO have a new reason to hate Indiana: Kelvin Sampson and his theft of Eric Gordon). Bruce Webber is a great coach. He knows his X's and O's. But he's not shown himself to be a great recruiter. No matter how well he can manage the court, he'll still be taking his Marcus Arnolds up against the Greg Odens of the world.

And it started out to be such a great decade...

Thanks to all the folks who have still been checking in over the last month. You guys are great! I've been trying to stay current with your when I can, but this blogging thing is tough for me. First of all, I am a painfully slow writer. Oh, I have ideas running thru my head all the time, but corralling them into a coherent thought takes me hours. Would you believe that I've been sitting here typing this for 2+ hours? 2 hours for this dribble? Makes you wonder why I even began this endeavor. Have you ever wondered why I don't comment very often? You wouldn't believe how clever I think I need to be in the 2-3 sentences I'd like to leave on your sites - especially when you folks write such great stuff! I wish I were as fluent here as most of you are. You write like you speak and converse. That doesn't come easy for me. Like a lot of things in my life, I need to work extra hard to not sound like the idiot I am.

Secondly, because it takes me so long for an entry, I need to write when everyone is either out of the house or in bed. This is still a problem. When I was at the "top" of my blogging game, I was writing after work or after supper - during prime family times. It became a source of contention between me and my family. So I scaled back to blogging late at night. That worked for a while. Then the sleep issues came and I had to step out. I thought the CPAP machine had corrected this (I am sleeping better), but I didn't realize how dependent my nights had become on caffeine. Over the last 2-3 months, I've tried to limit caffeine intake to 2 cans of pop in the morning. The rest of the day I drink either Diet Rite Pure Zero or water. What this means is that come about 10pm or so, I'm ready for bed, in a good kind of tired way. But that means my blog output (writing, reading, and commenting) is for squat. I try to get thru what I can before I go to work, but that isn't always much.

Lastly (you know, it had to be in threes - it's the perfect writing number), I've been in a writing funk for about a month. Ideas come to me, but if I don't deal with them when they show up on my brain's front door, they lose meaning. And I can't write without a passion for something. And instead of the passion being like a wildfire I need to put out, it's been more like a matchstick that I can't hold on to very long. The only reason I can write this now is because I really feel it now. If I waited until morning, it'd probably be gone and there I'd be: another day without an entry. In the last month, I've let the following opportunities go by:

The passing of one of our tenants. Melvin died February 6th in his sleep at the age of 91. The night before he'd played cards with some friends and won every hand. Then he kissed his wife of 60+ years good night and said "I'll see you in the morning".
The passing of Anna Nicole Smith during the same week. The contrast between her life and that of Melvin's could take weeks to chronicle.
Two snow days from work. The pile I created with the snow blower melted just last weekend.
Driving 30 miles to sled down a hill that would barely read on a protractor.
Numerous lunches with the guys. In one, I had Pik driving around a building to 3 different entrances to pick up Rudiger, who was at a completely different place. The sad thing is that Rudiger told me where he was numerous times on the phone, and I just didn't get it. I'm no longer in charge of picking people up.
A special surprise I'm saving until the end of this post.
The special surprise turned me into a germaphobe for the past 4 weeks - to the point I wore a mask and rubber gloves to visit my dad and self-medicated myself with echinacea and amoxicillin from Mexico.
The Boy's birthday dinner at BWW.
Heroes!

I don't know where all this is going, except to let you know that I'm still here and I'm still reading. I'm not hanging it up or anything. I'll probably show up here and there when I can. Just like the Great Pumpkin traveling from blog patch to blog patch, I'll be looking for those entries that are the most sincere :)

On February 13th, central Illinois was hit with one of the biggest snow storms we've seen in years. 12-14" landed in my neighborhood. We sat in the house all day and watched it pile up in the driveway. And we smiled and smiled. Why? Because earlier that morning we received news that on March 20th we would be on a plane to Hawaii!!!

My inlaws celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary last year and wanted to do something special with the entire family. They put away some money from a couple of real estate sales so that they could take everyone on a special vacation to make some memories. Various destinations were tossed around until they decided on Hawaii. The initial plan was to go sometime in the November/December timeframe, but a deal came up on Expedia that they just couldn't pass up. So here we are, mere days away from Paradise! We'll be back on the mainland (just had to use that term) March 31st. Look for a Flickr album shortly thereafter.

I'd love to take each and every one of you with, but I'm only allowed one carry on and one personal item. If you can blow air up my nose for 6-7 hours a night, read the novel "1776" (unabridged) or sing/play the Beatles or Steely Dan in my headphones, you're welcome to come. But be prepared to be flung over my shoulders or stuffed in an overhead compartment.

Have a great weekend all! Go Heels! Sorry, Sue, but I just can't bring myself to root for Bill Self :)

Weekend Roundup

2007-02-05T22:53:00.000-06:00

Not much time to blog what's really on my mind tonight (and I'm alternating between writing and watching Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid on the Sleuth network - yes, Librarian, I missed recording Heroes again this week), so I thought I'd share a little update on the weekend's festivities:

My birthday was great. After getting up to feed Lance, let him out to do his business and quickly post some pictures, I went back to bed. Friday was my day off (I work 9 x80 with every other Friday off). The family allowed me to sleep until 9:15am (a rarity around here). It worked to both our advantages as they wanted to finish wrapping my gifts and decorating cards. When Prudence woke me, I was in the middle of deep REM sleep. Didn't really know where I was. After a few minutes I recovered enough cognitive ability to drag myself out of bed and make it to the dining room table. Remember this nugget when you see my picture below. Prudence baked my favorite cake - a sour cream coffee cake. That was breakfast for us all. After a round of blowing out trick candles - The Boy and Em couldn't wait to see me blow them out - they gave me my gifts: Band on the Run by Paul McCartney & Wings from Em; A DVD recap of the 2006 World Series from The Boy; Don't Shoot Me I'm Only the Piano Player by Elton John from Panda; and Captain Fantastic & The Brown Dirt Cowboy by Elton John from Prudence. What a haul! Do I have the coolest family or what? After the kids did some school and went to gym & swim, we made the trek to Champaign for Zorbas! The weather was bitterly cold, but the gyros were hot and garlicky! We can't quite get the kids to try them. They eat a Chicago style all-beef hot dog on a pita, so we're working them up to gyros. The Boy even said he wanted Zorba's for his birthday, so we may be back in a month. Excellent.
Saturday started out as a lazy day. Prudence and I alternated being up with the kids and dog and then back to bed. We didn't really get going until lunch. Then Prudence and Panda went shopping for ski/snow pants for Panda's first ski trip to Wisconsin next weekend. It'll be her first trip any significant distance from us without family. Naturally she's excited and we're a little nervous. But she'll be with a trusted group of people and 3 of her best friends. She'll be fine, but her mom will probably be a bundle of nerves. Anyway, with them shopping and a Saturday afternoon Denise the Menace marathon on Boomerang, I was set to do some blog customization. This place hasn't really felt like home since the move. Kinda like not having pictures on the walls. First, I was missing the Spaces banner DrCara worked up for me (Cara, we miss you!), so I needed to get that posted. Then there was the issue of fonts, colors and layout. Spent the better part of 2 hours making CSS/HTML changes to the template I'd chosen. Can you believe they didn't have styles for bulleted lists? I had to add the disc and circle statements all over the place. I'm still not completely happy with it, but I'd probably have to come up with my own template in order to be totally satisfied. That's too much work for now, so what you see here will probably still be here a year from now.
Sunday brought church, adult bible fellowship, some maintenance work at the duplex, and of course the Super Bowl! Our church had planned to show the game on 2 screens using projectors from different parts of the building. Then we read about the church in Indianapolis that was banned from having a Super Bowl party. While we didn't really agree with the application of the ruling, we didn't want to be in violation of the copyright law. So Friday our minister rented a 50" TV and we changed the layout of our fellowship hall. It turned out pretty well, and 50-75 people had a great time watching the game. Lots of good food, fun, and fellowship. About 90% of the attendees were Bear fans, so a number of folks went home full but disappointed. Because I don't have a true allegiance to any NFL team, I was just looking for a good game. Won't say it was the best game played, but there were plenty of exciting moments in the first half, and my buddy Bill finally got a professional championship from one of his teams (sorry, Bill, but I probably won't be rooting for the Northsiders anytime soon).

That's it in a nutshell. Hopefully I'll be back later this week what I really should have blogged about. But I'll have slept since then, so don't bank on it. Until then, stay warm!

Could Really Use One of These Today...

2007-02-05T05:35:00.000-06:00

The temp is -6. Thankfully there's not much wind, so the wind chill is only -9. But the dog demands his walk - even if it's only around the block. Hope I'm not a Chris-sicle by the time I get back. Just who IS the master around here anyway?

More life imitating TV, I guess...

I Didn't See My Shadow...

2007-02-02T07:16:00.001-06:00

...but judging by the frost on my nose, I'm guessing we still have a lot of winter left around here.

Yep, it's my Birthday. 43 years ago my mom gave birth to a 19" long, 10lb 9oz cinder block. Not much has changed - just a bigger brick. Unfortunately, the hair is almost the same.

To celebrate, I've uploaded some pictures to Flickr of me from my dad's house. You'll see a lot of bad red hair on a big head. Play close attention to the shirts. Wide collars, psuedo-turtlenecks, and ring zippers. Most (if not all) were either hand-me-downs or homemade. Feel free to comment. No shot is too low. It was the 70s, remember?

After The Boy and Em's gym & swim session at the YMCA, we'll make a trip to Zorba's in Champaign - home of the best gyro on the planet! I can't wait!

And be sure to stop by and give some love to my sister in the Ground Hog Order: Weimiegirl! She's promised to show off some technocolor clothes that would make Joseph jealous!

Have a great weekend, all!

For The Record...

2007-01-30T22:48:00.001-06:00

"Go on and write me up for 125 Post my face Wanted dead or alive Take my license and all that jive I can't drive 55!" Sammy Hagar from 'I Can't Drive 55'

Yeah, I saw your head bobbin', mouthin' the words with an angry Red Rocker look on your face, maybe even pumpin' your hand in the air at the make believe judge. Don't deny it. It's one of those tunes that just gets into your head and won't let go. Sammy at his best!

You've probably guessed it, but I can't drive 55. It was more like 70. Or so the local police tell me...

I was running late Monday morning, thinking about the various things I needed to get done that day, kinda in my own world. The road from my house into work starts off with a 5 mile stretch of country road - your standard Illinois rock-chip and oil variety. The rest is about 11-12 miles of nicely paved road. There are very few dips, twists, turns and trees as well. It's pretty straight and flat - another central Illinois fixture. So it's extremely easy to get ramped up for the ride into work - especially if you have a lead foot like mine. It also means there are not many places a police car can hide. Quite a combination. Almost makes you feel untouchable. Almost.

About 1 minute into my drive (which means about 1 mile from my house - how stupid am I?) I notice a pickup that I normally encounter headed the other way flashing his lights. This should have tipped me off right away that a smokey lay in wait up ahead. But I was so deep into my own head that it took a moment to "get" his signal. By then it was too late. The cop was sitting in the only green spot along the road. And he had me dead to rights. His lights went on and I pulled over. He asked if I knew how fast I was going. I knew I was going 70 (I glanced at speedometer right when I saw him - but until then, I had no idea), but felt I should give him a range - just in case his gun was running slow. So I told him 65-70. "Yeah, you were doing 70", he said. So if I don't learn anything else from this experience, I know that my speedometer is accurate. I was as polite as I could be, and he was friendly and nice in return. If it wasn't that I was $75 lighter, I'd say it was a pleasant transaction. For some strange reason, that wasn't enough. I had to share the story with the boys at work. During the rest of the day Rudiger, Ed and Pik made sure the wound wouldn't heal. Can't say I blame them. I'd have done the same.

After 7 tickets in 27 years, I think I've finally learned my lesson. But just in case, check back in 6 months and see what my top speed for the day was...

I Can't Drive 55 - Sammy Hagar

I think my favorite thing about this video is the dialog between Sammy and Claudio.

Sammy: "Ooowww! This thing is running great! Its running great. Runnin' smooth into the the curves! What did you do, Claudio?" Claudio (in his best Italian Kermit the Frog voice): " I just adjusted the cassidy cavern and the tire pressure."

No idea if he actually said "cassidy cavern", but it works for me.

Now to end this on a musical note (sorry, the bad pun came out before I could stop it). Which do you prefer?

Sammy Hagar as a solo act
Sammy with Van Halen
Diamond Dave with Van Halen
None of the above

I Though It Was Conditioner!

2007-01-28T22:28:00.001-06:00

Everyone showers in the shower in the master bathroom. Prudence, Panda, and me in the mornings. The Boy and Em of an evening. It cuts down on the number of baths we need to keep clean...and I'm too cheap to have a plumber come take a look at what makes the main bath shower leak to the basement when we use it. I'll eventually need to take care of #2, but until then, we shower in our shower.

Other than bar soap, we keep all bath products the ledge above the glass door to the shower. That is, until The Boy and Em were able to take showers by themselves (one of those magical milestones that parents long to see reached - much like walking, potty training, reading, etc.). Now we keep smaller bottles of shampoo and conditioner on the "seat" built into the shower just for them. When they were smaller (just a few months ago), the bottles would run out and they would come out of the shower - soppin' wet to the bone - into the hallway and yell "I'm out of shampoo!!!". We would come running, yelling at them to either call from the shower or dry off and then call for us, refill their containers from the containers on the ledge, and finish their shower. But they observed what we did and began plotting ways to help themselves. Mind you, they would need to stand on the built in seat and lean across the shower, lean on the glass door while they reached to the ledge above - while wet. All very safe ***insert eyeroll here***. So for the past few months, they've (scratch that - he's) been refilling the containers when they've run out. At least that's my interpretation, since I haven't been called to refill a container for a while. Until last Thursday, my/our ignorance has been bliss.

Even though the torch of bathing has been passed, hair styling is still left up to me. Yes, the man with no hairdo (should that be a hairdon't) does the hair of the little ones. Don't worry, it's primarily a part and either combed back (The Boy) or brushed straight (Em). When they're old enough to do their own, I'll step out and let them work on a something that helps define themselves, other than mohawks, blue/orange hair, etc! But I digress...

So last Thursday, Em comes out of the shower and I start brushing her hair. Its a gnarly mess! I ask her if she used conditioner. She tells me that The Boy told her they were out and that he found something else that would work. I asked her to show me and she said it was the pink vitamin E stuff. Huh? Never seen that in our shower before, so we went back in. There, sitting on the seat was Prudence and Panda's Skintastic Shaving Cream! Prudence ushers her back into the shower with explicit instructions about what NOT to use on her hair. After setting her straight and refilling their bottle with more conditioner from the cabinet, Prudence comes back to me and says, "I'm sooooo glad we don't use Nair!"

Six Weird Things

2007-01-22T21:07:00.001-06:00

Yeah, I know this is an old meme (and I've already things documented a number of weird rules here), but I told the some people I would do it, and I try to be a man of my word. Plus it saves you from hearing about a boring weekend - cleaning out my computer workshop (7 computer carcasses, 3 14" monitors, and 3 printers went to an electronic recycling center), 3 sick family members (Em - for almost a week - Panda and Prudence since Saturday), a busy day at church (running the computer for worship and leading my adult bible fellowship class), and 2 great football games (don't know who to root for now - I just want a good game!). Well, I guess it didn't save you from it after all. Some man of his word, huh? Let's just forget that happenend move on to the meme:

When I get napkins from a dispenser for myself, I always get 3. One at a time. And I count them in my head. "One, two, three".
Complete silence scares me. I can't sit in a room or ride in a car without turning on a radio or TV. Maybe I'm scared to be alone with my own thoughts...
I struggle to download only a song or 2 from an album. I always feel as tho I'll be missing something. Sure, there's always at least one cut that absolutely sucks (except for Sgt Peppers, Abbey Road, and Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs), but if I don't have the whole album, I don't have the whole album!
I watch "League of Their Own" every time it's on. I own copies on VHS and DVD and can watch it any time I want. But if I see that its on at 11pm before I shut off the TV before I go to bed, I tell myself "I'll just watch until the 'no crying in baseball' part." Next thing I know, Madonna's singing "This used to be my playground"...
I love to eat salt and butter on Zesty Saltine crackers. To save time (because the way I eat, I don't have much of it) and dirtying a knife, I dip the cracker in "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter", then spread the butter over the cracker with my tongue. Then I salt the cracker with a salt shaker. Did I mention these were SALTine crackers? I like salt.
I can't stand to pay for stuff I can usually get free or relatively cheap. Like bottled water, for instance. Pop, coffee, and other drinks take work to make. Water is already here, and water fountains abound! I'm probably just bitter that I didn't think of it first. Tacos also come to mind. It takes about $.25 worth of materials for a taco, and you get charged almost a $1 for one. This one probably boils down to the fact that it takes 5+ tacos to fill me up, which adds up to too many pesos for that meal! I feel like I'm getting swindled or something...

There you have it. More than you probably wanted to know. Just tell me when you want me to stop.

Musical Confessions

2007-01-18T19:51:00.001-06:00

Today is my 1st blogiversary. I actually owned a blog before January 18th, 2006, but did nothing with it until that date. I spent months reading other blogs while trying to figure out what I wanted it to be. I'm not sure it ever became what was stated here, but I never expected to be where I am now - with a whole host of people I've never met that I consider great friends. And for that I'm most thankful! So I dedicate today's blog to you - my blog buddies - who made this last year sooooo much fun!

Continuing in the spirit of self-deprecating humor from my picture post ("If you can't laugh at yourself, you can't laugh at anyone else"), I'm gonna come clean on a number of items that I consider embarrassing concerning my musical tastes. If you look at my Zen, you'll see about 12GB of solid music that appeals to most people my age. I've got your standards (Beatles, Dylan, Springsteen, U2, Police, Motown and Top 40 hits from the 1960-1990) as well as some not-so-standards, but great none the less (The La's, Aztec Camera, Let's Active, Color Me Gone, The Specials). But if you look hard, you'll find some "huh?", "you gotta be kidding me!" or "you pansy!" stuff. Other things haven't made it to my Zen - either because they're locked into vinyl or too stupid for me to buy. Without further ado, step into your priest's confessional (if you're Catholic) or try to talk me off the ledge, and let's get into the list:

I love Hollywood showtunes and musicals! The soundtrack to "The Music Man" may be in my top 5 favorite albums of all time. As a kid, I used to line up chairs in our dining room like a train, play the opening song ("The Traveling Salesman") and try to sing all the parts. I always wanted to be one of the Buffalo Bills ("Lida Rose, I'm home again Rose without a sweetheart to my name..."). Then there's "Oklahoma!" Gordon McRae voice while singing "Oh What a Beautiful Mornin'" and "People Will Say We're In Love" is something I still try to emulate today...without much success.
I can often be heard singing along to the following songs:
- "My Eyes Adore You" by Frankie Valli
- "Bad Blood" & "Laughter in the Rain" by Neil Sedaka
- "Afternoon Delight" by The Starland Vocal Band
- "Copacabana" by Barry Manilow (but don't call me a Fanilow!)
- "Muskrat Love" & "Love Will Keep Us Together" by The Captain and Tennille
- "Natural Woman" by Aretha Franklin (or Carole King)
My favorite artist to sing along to is James Taylor. My voice range matches his better than anyone else. Now if I just SOUNDED like him.
In addition, I love to sing in falsetto. The Bee Gees are best for that.
In grade school, shortly after I received my first tape recorder, I started making my own drumming tracks. I would bring my record player into the kitchen, grab 2 tall drink stirring sticks that looked like drum sticks, grab a container of tubbed margarine, cue the music, and begin my jam sessions. Unfortunately it was to songs like "The Night Chicago Died". If you've ever seen the Gilligan's Island episode where the Mosquitoes come to the island, I resembled and sounded like Gilligan as the drummer.
Speaking of "The Night Chicago Died", I think I owned 4 copies of that song - courtesy of K-Tel.
Just a couple of weeks ago I downloaded Bread's "Anthology". I'm currently listening to it a lot. "Diary" may be one of the saddest love songs I've ever heard.
I hate it when people get the lyrics wrong, but I've been wrong many times. Here are a few:
- Its "Love Train" (Spinners), not "Love Tree"
- Its "Sweet Hitchhiker" (CCR), not "Swing into Hyper"
- Its "Big Ol Jet Airliner" (Steve Miller Band), not "Big Ol Jet with the Light Off"
- and its "Love is like Oxygen" (Sweet), not "Love is like Boxed chicken" (although I could make an case for that)
For about a 1 year in college, I was into reggae big time. I spent a majority of my free time at Record Swap, a local used record store, talking to guys like Ronnie Reggae (scrawny white guy who looked like Dick Cavet) and Rasta James (who looked just like his name - always on roller skates with a boombox on his shoulder) and searching the bins for Peter Tosh, Gregory Issacs, Steel Pulse, and of course Bob Marley. I used terms like "I & I", "eyre'", "jah", and "spliff" like I grew up with them. And I referred to the Rastafarians as "my people". If I could, I would have looked like this:
I'm currently searching for a good Partridge Family compilation, as well as one for the Jackson 5 and Neil Diamond.
I enjoy listening to disco music. The "Saturday Night Fever" soundtrack rules!
"I'm Not in Love" by 10cc scares me to death. "Be quiet, big boys don't cry" still haunts me today.
Along with 45s of "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "Island Girl", I had copies of "The Streak", "Paper Roses", and "You Light Up My Life".
I owned a copy of Peaches & Herb's hit album "2 Hot!".

While not embarrassing, I need to get a few other things off my chest while still on the ledge:

I hate Bob Seger! Ever since he and Tom Cruise teamed up in "Risky Business".
Even though I claim that The Beatles are my favorite group of all time, I listen to way more Steely Dan.
More on The Beatles front:
- I think John Lennon is overrated as a solo artist. From his greatest hits compilation, I can listen to maybe 5 of the tracks and enjoy them. I blame much of this on Yoko (as do most other people on the planet).
- "Hey Jude" is my least favorite song of theirs. And it may be on my top 20 overrated songs.
- I have never listened to the entire "Yellow Submarine" soundtrack.
- I have never seen "Help!"

Whew! I feel better already! At least until that first comment comes in. Or maybe no comments come in. Gulp! Do I hear crickets???

How's about you? Do you have a musical confession you need to make?

The Side I Never Knew

2007-01-17T22:59:00.001-06:00

Today would have been my mom's 84th birthday. She was taken home to be with her Lord almost 3 years ago after a long battle with Alzheimer's. She was a great lady - the best I ever knew. (Sorry Prudence, but she'll always be first. But you know that you are 1A!) Dad has told me often since she's been gone that her time home with me was the best she ever knew. Not because I was a special child, but because she was never able to enjoy being a mom to my 3 older siblings.

Mom married her high school sweetheart right after her graduation in 1941. She had 3 kids before 1948, and during that time her husband had a tour of duty in Europe during WWII. When he returned, he came back as an alcoholic. After he'd get paid for delivering eggs, he'd be gone for days on drinking binges. In the early 1950s, he died of a brain aneurismal. Throughout this time, Mom had to rely on family (she had 9 brothers and sisters) and work to make ends meet. She (and I) grew up in a small town where everyone knew your name. The local banker took pity on her and lent her hundreds of dollars over the years - which she diligently paid back. She worked part-time as a waitress in her sister's cafe', but she spent most of her time at working for another sister in her printing business. I'm not sure how many years she worked there, but she became very proficient at setting and proofing type. Reading sentences backwards with letters and characters in reverse as well blows my mind! But she did all this at the expense of being home with her children. Like I said, she had plenty of family in the area to help with the rearing. Minus a couple of detours, everyone turned out alright. But she didn't get to enjoy them.

Things changed for her in 1961 when she met my dad. They hit it off almost immediately and were married in March of 1962. I was born in 1964 and she was determined to make up for lost opportunities. She never worked an outside job again. She was home when I left for school in the morning and was there when I got home. She helped me with my homework. I can't count the number of class projects and crafts she helped me make. In three months of hard work and eye excercises, she "cured" me of my lazy eye. I didn't need glasses until my freshman year of college. Dad traveled about 2-3 nights of the week, so she and I were left to eat meals by ourselves. She always made my favorite foods, even though she'd sometimes just have cereal or a salad. And she aways had time for me.

So when I ran across this picture this weekend, I started thinking about the side of Mom I never knew, and how fortunate I was to be born when I was. Thanks God. Thanks Mom. And Happy Birthday.

Now THIS is embarrassing!

2007-01-12T20:25:00.001-06:00

Sue, I believe this is the kind of picture that your little sister was looking for.

I don't know much more about the picture than what you see here. It's an 8-10 year old boy with a big belt and very tight t-shirt sitting under his mom's beauty shop style hairdryer with a cap on his noggin to protect his 'do. I see nothing wrong with it...other than it's me! Don't know why I was there or why Dad was there with the camera. But I think the expression says it all.

How about some of the other items on the back porch? The yellow pencil sharpener that seemed to always be filled with filings. The BB/pellet gun for shooting cans (never know when a can is going to jump out at you!). The technicolored pants (bottom left in the stack of clothes) that made me look like Bobby Brady . Ohhh, the memories...

Can anyone top this? I'd love to see you try :)

"Lunch Buddies! That's what they'll call us!!!"

2007-01-10T22:37:00.000-06:00

Shortly before Christmas, Prudence and I received a coupon for a free meal at our local Ned Kelly's Steakhouse. Its a favorite place to eat, but because of the craziness of December, we weren't able to use it then. It's set to expire tomorrow, so she and I have plans to use it during my lunchtime. Not the most ideal use of this coupon (it's valued for a meal up to $15 - hard to do at lunch), but we/I would feel like I'm throwing away money if we/I don't use it. Plus she and I can alway use a getaway meal just to ourselves!

But this brought up a discussion of my lunches. Some of my favorite stories happen during the lunch hour. I haven't had much of an opportunity to share them here - partly because they can be long and involved (you really need to know the personalities in order to see the humor in many of them) and partly because I don't think I "own" many of them, so I don't feel like it's my job to share them. Not that I've been immune to being the butt of jokes - I'd say I'm probably 1 or 1a in that department - but they seem to belong to the group. There have been instances where we've witnessed some strange people, some bizzare exchanges between customers and/or servers (at times its been one of us on the weird end), and have even witnessed people being fired ('member our flannel friend, Bill? He ALWAYS got us the big pops!). Maybe I'll share some of these in the future, but today I need to share some of the lunch personalities, rules and quirks so you'll feel part of our group. Not that I would go and brag about that. Most people want to have nothing to do with us. Just think nerds in a fast-food rut that like to talk about bodily functions and all things potty and you pretty much have us pegged. But just to be sure, let me tell you about a few:

Chris
- Likes lunches that are a good mix of volume and price. Usually goes with value meals, unless the same volume/taste can be achieved by piece-mealing from the regular menu.
- Always chooses the same thing on the menu. And its usually the item that they're known for. If its McDonalds, its a Big Mac. If it's Wendy's, its the Single. If its Arbys, its the roast beef. You find something you like and you go with it. Forever.
- The Whopper has fallen from his best burger value in town to probably 3 or 4. And BK's fries suck.
- Speaking of fries, McD's are the best. Very tasty and salty. Plus McD's has salt that is like white gold. Yeah, he knows its bad for him, but he's a salt-aholic.
- It drives him nuts to see people arrive at the register of a McDonalds and STILL not know what they're getting.
- Usually eats his entire lunch without taking a drink. This is a bummer because he feels he's missing out on free refills.
- KFC buffet, Buffalo Wild Wings on Wednesday ($.50 legs), and Ming's chinese are his favorites, but rarely eats there. More on this later.
- Earlier this year brought his lunch for about 4 months in a row. Each day featured a ham sandwich, a bag of chips, a Ding Dong, and an apple or banana. No deviation. Unfortunately this led to a burn-out on ham. And this was from a guy who once boasted he could eat ham every day. Now he's struggling to come up with another sandwich substitute.
Ed (also known as "El Cheapo")
- Driven by cost. It could be dog crap as long as it's priced right. He is easily angered if he calulates that someone else's meal cost 3 cents less just because they went with a smaller drink that could have been refilled. Feels cheated that he didn't figure out until the end of the summer that he could have piece-mealed his McD's value meal with a ginormous $.69 pop and saved $.80.
- Because of cost, he has a short list of eating establishments. If its not McDs, Taco Bell, Taco John's, or Sam's Club (1/5 of pizza and pop for $2.72), he's going to complain.
- He feels guilty for eating the kids pizza meal at Schlotzkey's, even tho it is the same meal as the "adult" meal and is $2 cheaper.
- He's a pickle only person on his burger. He inspects each order for traces of other substances. If there's a pinch of lettuce or a dice of onion, he's going to complain. Not to the servers but to us.
- An addendum to the "pickle only" order: if the pickles are stacked, they need to be redistributed. If they don't fit on the burger in one level, they come off the sandwich and are never eaten. This bothers Chris to no end.
- If a fry has a brown spot on it, he won't eat it. This also bothers Chris. But sometimes it benefits him because those will be deferred to him.
- He has a gentle digestive track. Almost all foods disrupt it. And there is usually a rush to get back to the office facilities.
Pik
- His diet is much like Ed's. Burger places dominate (and he's a "ketchup only" dude), but is more flexible. Almost always suggests Longhorn Smokehouse, but is usually shot down. Not that we don't like it, it's just fun to do.
- His teeth are in perfect condition, because he rarely chews his food. Much like a snake, he uses his esophagus to push the food to his stomach where his bodily juices take care of the rest.
- Also an extremely fast eater. He always orders last and finishes first.
- Has been known to pull into the parking lots eating establishments only to turn around and go to a less popular place, much to the chagrin of Chris.
- When he brings his lunch to work, he usually eats it at his desk before 10am. But he usually has the will power to resist buying anything at lunch - something Chris doesn't do.
- He's usually the bearer of a card or coupon that will save us some cash. For an entire year we ate once a week at Wendy's for a $.40 savings per meal on a card he bought from some high schooler. The next year Dave died and prices went up by $.40. Go figure.
Rudiger
- Newest member of the regular lunch group - primarily because his other lunch buddy moved to Texas. We were the default choice.
- Complains about Ed's choices in food. No chinese, no good mexican, no gyros, no anything else. I'd say they might come to blows in the future, but that would be too much work for Rudiger.
- He is Chris' biggest ally for different food choices, but they rarely have enough power to outvote Ed and Pik.
- Money is no object when it comes to his choices. Another conflict with Ed.
- He can easily be talked into larger, more expensive meal deals by food service workers. Apparently he's weak minded to their Jedi powers.
- Typically doesn't "clean his plate". Chris is baffled by this.
- He will probably will tire of the group's food choices and stupid discussions and begin eating alone with his cat.

So there it is in a nutshell - my lunch buddies. Now that you have a feel for the group, look for a future installment of "Tales from the Lunch Line". But for tomorrow, I'll enjoy a normal lunch with my beautiful wife. It'll be a nice change of pace :)

Where do I begin?

2007-01-04T19:51:00.001-06:00

Man, this blank Windows Live Writer document looks blank! What do I fill it up with? Jean was right on the money when she suggested that I was using a picture of the kids as a "return strategy". Yes, I meant the well wishes and all - and I hope you all had a great holiday season! - but I couldn't really type more than a title and caption. The white space scared me. It felt like my first entry. Might have even been worse - people might be reading it this time! So just leaving the post with a picture of the nice smiling kids (a moment which took nearly an hour to "capture"!) seemed like the easiest thing to do.

But where do you begin after a 3 month absence? It's not like I don't have stories to tell. I ALWAYS have stories to tell. But which ones are "blog-worthy"? Which ones are of general interest? Which ones can I tell succinctly (couldn't do it before - don't know why I think it could happen now)? We'll, here's my attempt to tell the highlights from the last quarter of 2006:

The Cardinals are World Series Champions! No, I didn't believe in my team. I thought they were lucky to win their division. And they were. I thought they'd get by the Padres, just because the only division weaker than the NL Central was the NL West. And they did. But I was sure they'd lose to the Mets - even without Pedro. But they gutted it out - something they hadn't done consistantly since 2005. Yadier Molina hit the homer that quieted the crowd and Adam Wainwright made the Card killer Carlos Beltran look like a high schooler with hi s nasty12-6 curve ball. Its a game that will go down as one of the greats in Cardinal postseason history. But I thought that was it. There wouldn't be enough gas in the tank to take on the Tigers - especially after they man-handled the A's in 4. One sportswriter even said that the Tigers would win the Series in 3 games. And I believed him. But the Cards didn't. Jim Edmonds started giving out a game ball with each win in the post season. That single act brought the team together in a way no one could predict. That, and the fact that the Tigers' pitchers couldn't field their way out of a paper bag didn't hurt. Yeah, there are a lot of excuses for why the more powerful teams didn't win. But I'm tired of making excuses for why the Cardinals won. This team won 105 and 100 games the previous 2 seasons. They were a good team that finally pulled it together when it counted! And "we are the champions, my friend! And we'll keep on fighting 'til the end!"
CPAP spells good sleep One of these days I'll chronicle the whole sleep apnea ordeal. But suffice it to say that it's bad when I'm falling asleep during World Series games in which my team is playing - and winning! Come the end of October, I was nearly worthless after 8pm. It wasn't uncommon for me to come close to dosing off at my desk and behind the wheel driving home. Mornings felt like I had just gone 15 rounds with Muhammed Ali. And I wasn't a pleasant guy to be around. On October 23rd I visited with the pulmonary doctor who could refer me to a sleep clinic. Because I have an awesome wife who is always thinking ahead, I already had an appointment scheduled November 1st for a sleep study. The first half of the night they monitored my sleep. During the second half I slept hooked up to a CPAP machine. I didn't notice the dramatic change that Prudence did during her test, so I thought there might be something else wrong. Boy, was I surprised to hear from them 2 business days later with a prescription for a machine! November 7th was my first full night on it. I didn't see a change until about 2 weeks later when I noticed that I wasn't tempted to pull a Costanza and take a nap under my desk. After a month I felt like my old self - for better or worse. Sure, its weird getting hooked up like I'm diving off the Great Barrier Reef and its as unromantic as it gets with both of us looking like intensive care patients. But we have our lives back, and that counts for a lot!
It was such a good Friday... The Friday after Halloween started off to be a great day. Work in the morning was really productive. At lunch, we saw the van for a local radio station parked at Krispy Kreme giving away free gas cards (worth $10-$200 in gas - you wouldn't know how much until you filled up and checked the balance) and 2 liter bottles of cola. We were the last ones to get cards. Mine was worth $20 and almost filled up my car. After work I stopped by Walmart to check out the prices on leftover Halloween outfits and supplies. Picked up $100 worth of stuff for $30 - including something I hope to use in a post soon! My SIL and her family was going to visit for the weekend and bring pizza from our favorite Chicago pizza place (a mom & pop place called Dominic's). So life was good. That was until about 10 miles from home. Prudence called and said Lance had an accident in the house. We were out of carpet cleaner, so I needed to stop by the grocery store before coming home. When I walked in, the smell hit me immediately - and I was on the opposite end of the house from the mess. Walking into The Boy's room, I found a crap that could have easily been a 3-D map of the Phillipines! Pooh everywhere! An hour later I was finally eating pizza, although it seemed to have a "wang" to it. I'm sure it was just me...or should I say Lance.
Pork Loin for Thanksgiving Anyone? Thanksgiving had a completely different feel this year. My sister who normally hosts a gathering for my side of the family couldn't get her kids together on a date, so we meet and eat. On Thanksgiving day we were to travel to Prudence's sister's house in Lombard. But at 8am we received a call from her stating that her 5 year old daughter was still sick with the flu from earlier in the week. We had just finished a 2 week pukefest in our house and were still feelin' a little puny. Had it been an adult, we might have been able to avoid contact, but with our little ones playing with her, we figured the odds were stacked against us. Didn't need to do that again, so we stayed home. But SIL was providing the meat - we were just bringing a side dish and dessert. What were we going to do about food? Fortunately we had a pork loin in the fridge ready for the weekend, so we had that on the grill. Delicious! The weather was also spectacular for late November (in the 60s!), so I put up Christmas lights on our roof without a coat. A rare treat - especially when the next weekend brought a big ice and snow storm. Late in the afternoon we went to see "Flushed Away" and filled up on the butteriest popcorn you'll ever find. Black Friday brought another challenge. Prudence and I usually hit the stores starting at 4am with the kids home with a college age kid staying with the kids all day while we finish about 90% of our Christmas and birthday shopping and also take in a movie. The girl couldn't make it this year, so the plan was to leave the kids with SIL in Lombard and pick them up on Saturday. Now with a sick cousin, we had a quandry: could Panda take care of the house and get along with little bro and sis for the morning? She felt as if she could, but we had to get buy-in from the rest of the troops. So Thursday night after the movie we had a family pow-wow about Friday morning. Everyone seemed agreeable to the terms, so beginning 8am on Friday, we started calling about every hour or so to check on things. We arrived home at 12:30 with pizza. Everyone did a great job, so I think we have a new babysitter for Black Friday and potentially other date nights!
Finally, a snow storm to talk about! December 1st brought a big snow storm to Illinois. The big stuff didn't start until the early morning hours. 40 miles east of us, it was all rain. 20 miles away had mostly ice followed by 4" of snow. Power was out to a number of communities. Hundreds of power lines and poles were down. Trees were down all over the place, including at my buddy Bill's house. We had some ice and a little more snow (6"-8") and fortunately never lost power. It was enough for my work to close its doors. So we watched it come down all morning, ate lunch, then went out as a family to clear drives and sidewalks. The kids and Prudence tried to make a snowman, but could only make a snow pyramid. At about 6pm we called it quits and came in to warm up. We were tired, but it was a good kind of tired.

Christmas and New Years were fairly uneventful. 100+ Christmas cards were mailed (thank goodness for address databases and mailing labels!), many presents were wrapped and exchanged, plenty of Lego Star Wars and ATV Offroad Fury 2 on the Playstation 2 was played, and we watched the ball drop in Times Square from the comfort of our living room.

That about brings you up to speed on the 3 Hour Tour household. As you can see, I got over my fear of the white space:) Hopefully you can use this post as a sleep aid - its much cheaper than a CPAP machine! And if I learned anything from writing this post, it has taught me is to never be this tardy again! 3 months is too long. More to come soon. Very soon!

Have Yourselves a...

2006-12-22T21:09:00.000-06:00

More posts to come in 2007. I promise!!!

Why They Play 162...

2006-09-26T23:24:00.000-05:00

Yes, Ed. I'm talking about baseball. America's pastime. At least it used to be, until Pete Rozelle and Paul Tagliabue made every move in the NFL a televised event. Monday Night Football. Thanksgiving games. Draft day. Oh, and the championship game played in late January or early February. What's it called? Oh, yeah. The Super Bowl. I'm sure I'll be sued for using it on my blog "without express written consent of the National Football League".

But before all of this, there was baseball. The defining sport of a nation. An eliquent game with a ball, a stick, 3 strikes, 4 balls, 3 outs, 4 bases on a diamond, 9 innings, 18 players, and 140/154/162 games. Every starting pitcher has the possibility to pitch in 30-35 games. Starting position players get 500 at bats to get hits and multiple chances per game to record an out. People who follow baseball don't talk about games, but groups of games called series. The game is all about providing chances to prove yourself. And what's more American than that! Right now I'm watching my team (the St Louis Cardinals) play their 156th game to prove their worth for post season.

Early in the season the Cards showed they could be the class of the National League by winning series after series and leading their division by as many as 11 games. A 4-game losing streak in early May showed the could be beaten, but they quickly righted the ship. But then June came and they lost more than they won. They even lost 8 in a row during a stretch at the end of the month, but because the rest of the teams in their division were also losing their lead remained big. Winning 3 out of 4 against rival Houston gave everyone renewed hope that they would return to form.

But by the midsummer classic, their form was already showing. The starting pitching struggled to go deep into games. The bullpen struggled to hold leads. Their closer, Jason Isringhausen, blew more save opportunities than he had in years past. But fortunately they had the best player of this generation in Albert Pujols (go ahead and challenge me on this, but he's doing things only legendary hall-of-famers did) to save their fannies. And this year he's doing it without the help and protection of Scott Rolen and Jim Edmunds. In addition, the defense up the middle has been average at best, where in previous years it had been incredible. But when the math still came out, the positives still outweighed the minus, and the team was still good. But they had another 75 games to play...

Playing .500 ball will not win you championships. Another 8 game losing streak in July/August will not win you championships. Playing less than .500 ball loses your home field advantage. A 6 game losing streak at the end of September when the teams right behind you are on winning streaks leaves your magic number at 5 for the last week and reduces your lead in the division to 2.5 games. If you lose the division, your record is so pathetic you can't even make it as the wild card. It's do or die. And right now, the Cards are on life support. Will they make it into the post season? We'll know this weekend. If my heart can take it.

But that's why they play 162. That's the beauty of the game. After that many chances, we find out what teams really deserve to be in the playoffs. It's not like the NBA or NHL (who's really following this sport anymore - baseball barely survived losing a World Series, let alone a whole season!) where half the league makes the second season. And football has a good season length, but because of the brutal nature of the sport, the loss of a key player for a week or 2 can be the difference between a playoff birth and a good position in next year's draft. But in 162 game in 180 days, you can measure a team's metal for the long haul. Sure there are streaks (both good and bad), but they even out. Guys go down, but many times they have a chance to come back - just like Jim Edmunds did last night with a 3 run home run in his first at-bat after a month out of the lineup. But the patterns of the team will develop and be evident to everyone over the course of the long season. The right teams will win and lose. And the true champion will be crowned. Unfortunately, it probably won't be St. Louis.

Tonight, the boys wearing the Birds on the Bat lose again. Ace pitcher Chris Carpenter gives up 4 runs in a disasterous 7th inning to put the Padres ahead 6-5. In the 8th inning, Pujols comes up as the tying run at the plate, but just misses his pitch and pops it up to center field. A lead-off hit in the bottom of the 9th goes to waste as the rest of the order goes quietly. The losing streak is 7 - the Cardinals have now had 3 losing streaks of 7+ games (not the mark of a division champion) - and their lead over the Astros is 1.5. Earlier this month, a fellow Cards fan sent me an email rejoicing when the Cubs had finally fallen to the cellar. I couldn't join in the jocularity knowing the Cubs were also the team involved in one of baseball's most famous collapses. Now we might be replacing them in the history books.

You know, maybe 156 games is better measure of a team...

Over-The-Shoulder-Boulder-Holders

2006-09-21T00:46:00.000-05:00

When was the last time you heard that term? Third-grade? Well, welcome to my reality! I'll get to the reason why this is the title in just a moment, but first: an introduction into the story...

Our house is just over 7 years old and most of the rooms still have the contractor's High-hiding White paint on the walls. If you've ever been in a new construction with contractor paint, you know this stuff is not meant to last more than a month without showing wear. Add 3 kids, a dog, and an incredibly slobbish guy and you get a cave. Suffice it to say that I have a lot of painting to do.

One of the rooms in desperate need of fresh paint was the hall bathroom. Because we began an Illini theme to the room a few years ago (a couple of U of I landmark sketches, an "Illini Fans Parking Only" sign hung above the potty, and navy blue shower curtains and towels), I thought it would be great if the room were painted orange. Prudence balked at the idea. When she consulted one of our friends, Sue, who's taste she trusts, she thought she'd get different response. But Sue was on my side! So Prudence agreed to a trial period on an Illini orange paint job. She seems to think it was 2 months, but I don't remember a time period being set (but that's a different argument...). Since I didn't want the agreement to expire - guys, you know what I'm talking about - I needed to get the paint bought and on the wall...pronto! So this past Saturday afternoon, I made plans to go to Lowes and get my supplies for painting Sunday afternoon (it was supposed to rain).

When I told Prudence I needed to make a Lowes run, she asked me if I'd run a couple of other errands: look for dress shoes for The Boy and return/exchange/buy some items at Kohl's. Save a trip into "town" and saving some gas? Sure, just print off the descriptions of the items at Kohl's and I'll pick them up for you. This is where the title comes into play.

She wanted me to by a couple of bras for Panda.

I'm comfortable doing the laundry containing bras. I'm okay with seeing models in the Sunday ads containing women in bras. I've even come to grips that my daughter wears a bra (and has a monthly "visitor" to boot). But I'm not at ease with buying them. At a store. In a department that has never had a drop of testosterone in its isles. In front of people. Women somewhat, but mainly guys starring in from the "outside". Laughing. Even worse, not laughing but thinking I'm weird (in a way I'm not used to being thought of).

I gotta buy over-the-shoulder-boulder-holders. OTSBHs.

Suck.

Since I'd already "won" a victory with the orange paint, I thought I'd better keep up the good vibes and agree. My only stipulation was that everything about the bras needed to be written down on a piece of paper that could be handed off to a lady in that department so she could get the product for me and I would never have to set foot on their "domain". I'd still have to take them to the register, but there I could mix them in with other buys. The beauty of online shopping made this request a piece of cake. Now I needed to come thru with my end of the deal...

I arrived at Kohl's and make the necessary returns/exchanges. Now it was time for me to come thru. Fortunately Kohl's was running a good sale on long-sleeve dress shirts. Mine all look like crap, so I knew I'd be able to buy 2 or 3 to hide the OTSBH. I ended up with 6, just to make sure. Then I made my way to the "intimates".

I walk up and find no one to help me. Other departments have 2-3 people restocking shelves and refolding the merchandise, but there's no one close to the bras. I walk around the perimeter, hoping that the items would be on the endcaps and that they'd just jump into my arms (and underneath my shirts, of course!), but alas, it was not meant to be. So I wander into the Misses department right across the way and ask 2 women employees for help. They were sympathetic to my cause and rushed into action. Unfortunately they claimed to have no expertise in the bra department (huh?). Betty was the chief stocker for intimates and would be able to find what I wanted in a snap. The way they went to look for Betty was like I was a crash victim and they were looking for medical help. And of course they had to talk about it. Loudly. To each other. I felt like I was Michael Keeton in Mr Mom needing a price check on tampons. But in all their hustling and bustling (pun intended), they were able to scare up Betty. I gave her my sheet of paper and she said she new just where she put the items. Apparently they took up too much room in the middle of an isle, so they had to be moved to an endcap. But the endcap was within her intersanctum. And she wanted me to follow her. I paused at the place where the tile walkway gives way to the carpet of the department. It was almost like I was going into Narnia. I just hoped that Betty wouldn't be the White Witch. So I entered.

Betty showed me the bras I needed. They looked just like the other thousand that surrounded me. I just wanted to get 2 of them and leave! Then she asked me, "What color?" That was the one detail that wasn't on the sheet. Suck. I assumed that the color should be white, but you know what they say about "assume". So I called Prudence to confirm. Yes, 2 white bras. Well, they only had one in Panda's size. So Betty took me to another endcap to look for another. Please let there be one there to end this! No? Double suck. Oh, well, one's better than none. I'll be on my way. But no. Betty's good at her job. She told me that another shipment came in earlier in the day and that she wanted to check in back. She asked me to wait right there while she looked. I told her I'd wait in the main walkway until she returned. Time seemed to stand still. And it felt like everyone was watching me. To throw them (whoever "them" might be) off, I stared at the housewares. Great plan - I think it worked. Soon Betty returned letting me know that she couldn't find another. More loud talking, now in the middle of the big isle! "Thanks for all your help!" and I'm outta there. At the checkout, I had to fight back the urge to explain my purchase to the clerk. But once I got by her I was home free! Fortunately I saved the Lowes trip for last. It felt good to be back in a guy's element: spackling compount, sand paper, paint brushes, etc. Ugh! Ugh!

I was able to paint the bathroom on Sunday (and Monday because it takes semi-gloss too long to dry on cool rainy days). It turned out awesome! I just hope Prudence comes to like it as much as I do. If anything, she'll probably not ask me to buy any more OTSBHs if I have to get more paint...and I won't feel obliged to do so!

Livin' Like The Jetsons!

2006-09-15T23:25:00.000-05:00

After years of sending Prudence every day down the road a quarter mile to the crick down by Jimmy's house to wash the clothes on a rock, I decided we could splurge this year and upgrade our laundry process. What do you think?

Actually, Prudence hasn't done the wash on a rock in years:) The drum in the Maytag we've had for the last 12+ years began to leak about 2 months ago. I called the local repair man and found out that it would cost $250+ to fix, so we began the research. And I'm using the royal "we" on this one. You've got to know Pru to know that no purchase like this is done quickly or easily. Every website and resource is read and re-read and everyone that's purchased a similar item is grilled. She was intrigued with the promises made by the front load washer people. Bigger loads, less water, and cleaner/"dryer"/less worn clothes at the end of the wash cycle. And for the most part she found they were true. Everyone she talked to raved about them. The biggest deterent was the cost - $1000 (after stand and sales tax) for the one most people recommended: the Whirlpool Duet. But most people claimed that the payback in water alone would be in about 3-5 years. Labor Day weekend most everyone was running sales (and some with 1 year free financing!), so I told her she needed to pull the trigger. So she got Best Buy and Lowes in a price war, and Lowes wanted her business more. She drives a hard bargain! Gotta love that girl!

Last Saturday the beast was delivered - free (part of Prudence's deal)! She stayed home from The Boy's soccer game to be there for the delivery dudes. They did an excellent job. I guess the biggest complaint with these washers is that they spin so hard and fast that they shake the whole house if not leveled right. The guys put in a load of towels (the heaviest thing we had a lot of), did a wash and rinse and leveled the thing to the point where I can't hardly hear/feel it when it runs. Even quieter than our old one! They were there about 1 hour and Prudence and Panda were able to make the end of Em's game. When we arrived home, everyone crowded in our laundry room to bask in the glow of the miracle machine. Prudence announced that it had a DVD that we needed to watch in order to run the thing. A DVD? To run a washing machine? Yep. And The Boy couldn't have been more excited. He swore he'd watch the DVD all day. Need to get the kid out more. Anyway, all of us rushed into the living room and for the next 30 minutes were educated on the new way to clean clothes. The washer would dispense soap, bleach, and fabric softener at "just the right times" to take the thinking/guesswork out of laundry. But it was very picky about what kind of soap to use and how much to put in it. It had safety features that would prevent the device from being used for evil instead of good by young laundramateers. Unfortunately, the washers-in-training were also in the room, so they now know all its secrets. Drat!

After we'd received our training - I'm still waiting for my framed certificate - we all went to the laundry room to give her a spin (pun intended). The Boy called us on every cycle change. It was amazing to watch it lazily flop our clothes around during the wash cycles and then turn around and spin like it was trying to open a wormhole for time/space travel. After an hour, everything was finished. The clothes seems to be a little dryer, and there was more of them to put in the dryer. The dryer took everything in and dryed them as promised. It was purchased 6 months earlier after the Maytag dryer failed for a 3rd time. We went with an extra large conventional dryer then as Prudence's research showed that there was no advantage to purchasing a fancy front loader to match a future front loading washer. Time will tell if it saves the condition of our garments and money in our checkbook. No one at work has commented on my cleaner duds. And if they did, I'd have to get another job. Might have to anyway to pay for this new luxury...

Anyway, this new gadget makes me feel like George Jetson! Now where do I pick up my space plane and the automatic dog walker?

All I need...

2006-08-29T08:45:00.000-05:00

...is $99,000 and my fantasy life will be complete! How can a guy who has a blog named "Three Hour Tour..." and an email that starts with ssminnow7 NOT OWN THIS??? http://www.ablboats.com/details.asp?ListingID=74883 I'll be accepting donations via PayPal...

"It's not my bag, baby!"

2006-08-24T21:56:00.000-05:00

I love it when life imitates the movies, especially when it's one so shagadelic! Next, this guy will be wondering if the female security guard is a man, baby!

Click here for the details...

I Can't Think About Elvis Without Thinking of Cheech, Chong and Mom

2006-08-16T02:30:00.000-05:00

Note: Caveat Reader! Let the Reader beware! I feel a rambling post coming on. This topic has too many tentacles to my past for me not to get wrapped up in a number of them. Hopefully it will be an enjoyable read. It's a story I love to tell, especially on this day - the anniversary of the event - but I've never written it down before. When I tell it, I feed off the comments of others to make it more entertaining, usually in a self-deprecating way. But none of you are here as I write, so I'll have to draw on past experiences of telling the tale. My good friend Ed is the one I like to tell it around most. He shares my appreciation for one of the items involved, and he has the keen ability to make me laugh hard at my moronic behavior. I also like to remember my mom in this pose. It's how I picture her uttering her "lines", and it makes me feel warm inside

See, lots of tentacles, and I haven't even started. Don't say I didn't warn you...

It was the summer of 1977 and I discovered the drug culture. No, not like that. In the safest way you can - by comedy. One afternoon, a guy 3 years my senior played his Cheech & Chong album collection for his brothers, his cousin (my neighbor), and me. And we were addicted. We began listening to them over and over, trying not only to memorize each line, but to emulate the voices of Pedro and Man, Ralph and Herbie, Sister Mary Elephant, Sgt Stedenko, Cheborneck, Basketball Jones, and of course, Dave. To this day, if anyone asks for a "Dave", my mind immediately repeats "Daves not here." Sometimes it comes out of my mouth. I find that I have to explain the bit more and more as the years pass. Thankfully Tommy Chong has made appearances in "That 70's Show" that make it easier to relate to the younger crowd (yes, I'm talking about you, Rudiger).

But meeting in the guy's house became old - and we worried that parents would listen to the records and ban them for their promotion of drugs, sex, and rock 'n roll. So we devised a plan to record the albums on cassette tapes that we could take anywhere. Unfortunately none of us had a stereo system, much less one that played LPs AND recorded stuff directly to tape. We weren't rich, you know. But I had a record player, similar to the one shown here, and access to a microphone and a Panasonic tape recorder via my dad's work. I could do the recording and bring the player out to the street corner of an evening so that we could listen and learn.

Now I had to find a good time to record. The room/house had to be relatively quiet and free from parental involvement. Mornings were out - too many good game shows on (Card Sharks, The Price is Right, High Rollers, etc.). Evenings wouldn't work - either I'd be outside hangin' out with the kids in the neighborhood, or I'd be watching great 70s TV, in all of it's 3 network + PBS glory. Afternoons would work best. Dad would be on the road, and Mom would be locked in on her soap operas, sitting in her favorite chair usually bundled up with an afgan my sister made for me when I was about 10. "All My Children" was on from 11am-12pm, "As The World Turns" from 1:130am-12:30pm (yeah, I know they overlap, but she'd usually choose "World" over "Children" - she could always catch up tomorrow on one or the other), and "Guiding Light" from 2-3pm. She used the 12:30-2pm time period to do chores around the house - especially the vacuuming. So really 2-3pm was prime time for recording. And before I'd begin, I'd tell her what I was doing so that she might make less noise.

So one August day - this day - I was setting up to record. Can't remember if it was Big Bamboo or Sleeping Beauty. Doesn't really matter - they're all good. I had the record player and tape recorder on the floor with the mic sitting next to the speaker. I limited my walking so as not to cause it to skip. If one occurred, I'd have to start again and I'd lose valuable time.

At about 2:20pm, I hear Mom's voice yelling for me from the living room. Now, you have to know my mom to know that you couldn't ignore her call. It was high pitched with a little lilt to it. She somehow managed to add a second syllable to "Chris" that drove me nuts as a kid. Often when I'd be outside playing at a friend's house on another block I could here her cry as clear as if she were standing right next to me. Uncanny.

But I was in the middle of a "session". Do I answer her and risk ruining the recording and losing time? Do I ignore her and hope she quits after 2-3 calls, thinking I may be outside or asleep? I couldn't get up to go to her because I'd risk skippage. What if, after failing to hear from me, she comes to investigate? What if she hears one of the routines? She'd already made me take down my Farrah Fawcett poster. What would she do with these tapes? As all this was running thru my head, I make the call to answer her in as short and quiet response as I knew how.

"Yeah?" I answered in the shortest, pimply-est voice I had at the time (maybe still do?), deflecting the sound away from the record player. My hope now was that it was some instruction rather than a question that I might have to give a long response to. She came back with one sentence I can still here to this day.

"Elvis Presley died."

At 13 I was not a big Elvis fan. Sure, I had a healthy respect for who he was and what he represented but I really knew him from the movies Channel 3 would show on "Dialing for Dollars" at 3pm - "Spinout", "Roustabout", "Blue Hawaii", etc. The music was fun, the girls were hot, and the settings were usually cool. Far from the rock icon he really should have been. But Mom knew this was a big moment in the entertainment world, and she thought I should know.

But I was recording Cheech and Chong! "Dave" wasn't there! Billy was about to get turned in to Sgt Stedenko! The stuff he gave Pedro "couldn't get a fly high". It was hilarious! And I didn't want to miss any of it! So I answered her.

"Okay."

That seemed to satisfy her, as I didn't hear anything more...

I would listen to the tape later and here the following exchange over top of the jocularity:

"Chri-is" (muffled but audible)

"Yeah?"

"........." (not as clear, but I knew what she said)

"Okay."

A few days after his death, Mom and I were traveling to Decatur for an orthodontist appointment. The radio was still buzzing about the death of the King. It was then I started to grip what the loss meant - to an industry, to a generation, and to a nation.

When I listened to the tape I thought of that day. Sometime in high school I lost track of the tape, but never the memory. I'd tell the story whenever Elvis was brought up in conversation. A few years ago, when Ed and I returned to our Cheech and Chong roots and bought all their stuff still in print, I remembered the tape with each track played. So imagine my surprise when I found this buried in the rubble that was my room:

I couldn't wait to get in my car that night and play it tape deck! To hear my mom yell again. To hear my stupid responses. To reconnect.

I wish I had a happy ending to this find. The tape had been reused. Gone were the voices. Worse yet, they were replaced by a episode of Mork and Mindy (what was I thinking???) My only hope is that this isn't the tape I'm looking for. Maybe its out there, still in a box I have yet to unpack. Maybe its in the box of "college stuff" I have in my basement. Wherever it is - if it still "is" - it will now be my "holy grail". Or should I call it my own "Zapruder film". One day it will surface. And when it does, I'll laugh like a pimply 13 year old and think of Mom...

So tell me: where were you when Elvis died?

Playin' Catch Up

2006-08-14T23:40:00.000-05:00

As usual, I'm behind on my blogging. Where are we on that lobby to add more hours to the day? Who do I see about that? Well, if it's a government office, it'll probably be a long wait, which leads me into the first item of the post...

Whoop! Whoop! For Whooping Cough!

Yes, our kids have a case of pertussis. Panda had a cough during the week of the fair, but nothing else. No cough medicines where helping to loosen it up or suppress it for sleep, so after the competition (BTW - she finished with 4 blue ribbons and 3 red. Not too shabby!), she went to the doctor. Neither Prudence or I were able to take her, so Oma did. The doctor called it a "100-Day Cough" and told them to go to the local hospital for testing. Once there, she took the test and they were told the samples would be sent to the state lab and it would take 10 days to get the results back. No other instructions. No medications. No nothin' else. When they arrived home and found out how much they DIDN'T know , Prudence called the doctor to ask more questions. We found out it was actually Pertussis (extremely contagious and particularly dangerous for infants and toddlers) and started calling families that Panda had spent any time with. Fortunately it was only 4 families, and all the kids were 7+. But unfortunately it wasn't until late last week that we were able to get medications to treat it. By then, The Boy and Em came down with a cough and had to go in for the test. We'll wait another 10 days for their official diagnosis, but luckily the doctor we saw at Convenient Care saw our need and prescribed a round of antibiotics for all of us. The kids, while doing much better, will still have their coughs for another 80+ days and be contagious until Wednesday, but since Prudence, Oma, and I have shown no effects from the disease, we've been released to the general public.

But if the government really wanted to control this infectious disease, I'd think they'd want to have a quicker turn-around time than 10 days (we've read your contagious for about 14 days, so by the time you get into the doctor, get the results back, its too late to do anything) and have a method to get those possibly infected medication ASAP. Am I off base on this?

Prudence Update

She's probably 60-75% to normal. She's sleeping on her side for portions of the night, but the results of her surgery are still waking her up. They said it would be 6-8 weeks before she'd be completely healed and it's been 3, so she's pretty much on target or ahead of the curve! Yea!

Has Anyone Out There Lost Any Weight?

If you have, stop looking for it. I know where it is :( With all the fantastic meals from Oma and friends from church, I've put on 5-7lbs depending on the time of day I weigh in. The past few days have been beautiful here in central Illinois, and I've been trying to take advantage of them with bike rides with the kids. But tonight's stop at the local ice cream establishment may sideline my progress. I just hope I don't have to grow much beyond 9ft to meet my ideal body mass index...

One Less Mama in the House...

Oma left today after 3+ weeks. She was a HUGE help to Prudence and I! The kids had a great visit with her! And I she made all of my favorite "Oma" meals (thus the reason for my recent weight finds)!

But Before She Left...

...Prudence and I were able to squeeze in 2 movie nights with free babysitting! Last weekend we saw Superman Returns. I had high hopes for this movie, but it fell on its face. To start with, the explanation (or lack thereof) of why Superman had been gone for 5 years in space (Did he eat/breath in space?) left a lot to be desired. Then it seemed that Brandon Routh was playing Christopher Reeve playing Superman. Too many layers to look genuine. I tired of all the long looks between Lois and Superman and Richard (the significant other since Supes was gone). And if I saw Jason (Lois' 5 year old son - special emphasis on "5 year") looking like pathetic Frodo Baggins with an inhaler, I think I'd have stabbed HIM with a Kryptonite stake! This went on for 2 1/2 hours! Only the special effects redeemed the time. Superman flying was cool, and so was his heat vision. But why did he have to go to the edge of space with everything? Uuuuggghhhh! This was not the Superman I grew up reading...

But our movie season was redeemed somewhat by World Trade Center. I really didn't want to see this movie when it was first announced because the subject matter was still to fresh and raw, and I was unsure how Oliver Stone would approach this world changing event. And much like watching Titanic, we knew how it would end. But after I read Sue's review (she's now vaulted past Roger Ebert and Richard Roper as trusted voices - thanks, Sue!), it occurred to me that we needed to see it more than Pirates of the Caribbean 2 (there's always DVD). Stone did a great job storytelling. He parked his politics at the door and told the story straight from the hearts of the 2 men rescued from the rubble. He pulled at the heart strings, but not with the images of that day that we're all so familiar with. The attacks on the buildings, and their subsequent destruction, were only referenced by what the men would have seen or heard that day. No big special effects. Just rumor, sound, and vibration. But it was just as effective. And much more real. The scenes of the men in the rubble and the reflections on their lives at what they thought might be the end caused me and others to think about what's truly important. And the themes of men and women pulling together in the face of incredible adversity will ring true for ages to come. Now I can't wait until Panda can see it. She was only 7 when it happened and couldn't put everything in perspective. But next year at 13, this movie will help.

Lastly

My mowing jobs have picked up. The regular rains we've had keep me mowing my 3 regular lawns every 5-6 days. This week I've picked up the across the street. They're celebrating their 55th wedding anniversary on a cruise to Alaska - how cool is that (55th AND Alaska) - and won't be back for 2 weeks. In addition, its my turn again for our church's lawn. And again, the person who mowed before me mowed early last week meaning that the grass is long now and will be long again by Sunday, so it'll need 2 mowings this week. Its a good thing I have a 6GB MP3 player...

And I HAVE to write a post for Wednesday. If I don't, I'll have to wait a whole year!. G, I know I promised the first story from The Butterfly House would be "The Label Maker", but it can't be helped. This story is that important! Well, maybe it's just important in my head. I'll let you be the judge when you read it. But if you can guess what it might involve, I'll send you a free MP3 that relates to the story. If only I could send you the ACTUAL MP3, but I'm getting ahead of myself...

Have a great Tuesday everyone! See you back here on Wednesday!

Thank you, thank you vera much.

Nemo - July ??, 2006 - August 9, 2006

2006-08-09T21:35:00.000-05:00

File Photo - May Not Be Nemo

Nemo, beloved first pet of Em 3HourTour, was found dead in his fish bowl just after 7pm August 9th, 2006. Funeral services were conducted around the hallway toilet in the 3HourTour home, as per the wishes of his family. His interment is the village sewer system. No foul play was suspected. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the charity of the donor's choice. He is survived by bowlmate, Bubbles. Nemo's life is a pond-to-pool story. While details of his birth and early life are not known, it was suspected that he was born and raised in a fishery, destined to be bait for tourists on a party boat in the Gulf of Mexico. But as luck would have it, he was rescued from that life to one just slightly better - 2nd prize in the ping-pong ball toss game at county/state fairs. He lived in a Coleman cooler with several hundred other "prizes" for several weeks during the hot Midwest USA Summer. However, his luck would change August 3rd, when Em would win him on her 20th toss at the McLean County Fair. He was brought home to live the life of a king in a 3/4 gallon fish bowl filled with neon rocks and sea shells, 2 meals a day, and fresh water every other day. His hobbies included breathing and swimming circles around his bowl. He was adored by Em to the very end.

Sucker Written on My Forehead

2006-08-05T22:17:00.000-05:00

36 ping pong ball tries: $5 Glass Fishbowl: $3.74 Goldfish Food: $1.32 Neon Gravel: $1.67 Aqua Safe for tap water: $2.88 Fish net: $0.94 Snaggletooth Smiles from 2 proud 10¢ fish winners: Priceless!

Thursday was all-day ride band day at the county fair. $8/kid to ride rides til they puke. Prudence, Oma and the kids met 2 other moms and their kids for lunch at McDonalds. Our kids stayed with the moms and went to the fair while Prudence and Oma left for a follow-up visit with Prudence's surgeon in Champaign. I met up with the families after work. Somewhere along the line the kids discovered the carnies hocking their promises of large stuffed animals, stereo equipment and bicycles. The Boy was sure he would win a bike tonight. The kid behind the counter made it look SOOOOOO easy to stand up the long-neck bottle with the stick, string, and ring at the end. The only questions in his mind were "will Dad give me the $5 to play the game?" and "when he does, how will we get the bicycle home?" At least that how one mom relayed it to me... So after 7 hours of riding almost non-stop, I pulled The Boy aside and walked him thru all the games and explained the point to each and every one of them. It always boiled down to separating him from his money. He would occasionally make eye contact with one of the workers and I would have to explain that we weren't interested. By the end I think he got the jist of it. After we had finished I told him he could have $3 to spend on any one game, and that he should chose one he had he best chance of walking away with something. It came down to 2 games: one where he was guaranteed to "catch" a box with a toy in it (you just didn't know what it would be), and throwing ping pong balls into a table of fish bowls hoping one would land in a bowl. Landing in a bowl with red cotton in it would give the winner a toy. Landing in one with white cotton gave a goldfish - a 10¢ fish that wasn't even guaranteed to be gold. He thought that the fish needed a home, so he'd give that one a try. On his 14 toss, one of the balls landed in a white cotton filled bowl. You should have heard him shout for joy. It was like he'd won the lottery! When Em finished riding the rides, I explained the situation to her. But once she saw The Boy's fish, she had to have one of her own. It took her 20 tries, but she was able to win one, too! I thought we had a fish bowl, rocks, et al, at home from a previous fish adventure with Panda, but I later found out we had given the stuff away to a friend of hers. Now the pressure was on to provide a home for our new fish friends. Two Mason jars worked as makeshift homes overnight. Quite frankly I wondered if we would have them the next morning. Interlude... I once won a fish at the Illinois State Fair. The carney gave me the actual fish and bowl I won it in - filled with water colored blue from food coloring. I won it sometime in the morning but wasn't going to leave the fair until 5pm. Luckily Dad was displaying some farm equipment and I could leave it with him. We changed the water when we got home, but the fish was dead the next day. My guess is he had the "blue lung". Returning to the story... Prudence and I both hoped that if one died, they both would. It would make life between The Boy and Em so much better. But they lived. So one of my errands on Friday was to purchase a fish habitat. $11+ later, plus a couple of shells from our visit to South Padre Island, Nemo and Bubbles now have a humble abode. No filter on the bowl means we - meaning I - have to change the water daily. This has only complicated matters in my mind. Now do I want them to live or die? Then I look at the picture again, and I know the answer...

Prudence Update: She's doing great! Everything is healing wonderfully. Her only issue is that she is still unable to sleep comfortably on her side. The Dr told her that may last another week or so. She alternates sleeping on her back with her legs elevated (she's had some foot swelling from doing too much) and sleeping in the recliner in our living room. This is getting old for her, but knowing its temporary makes it bearable.

She should be cleared to drive on Wednesday. I'm sure she'll want to exercise that freedom - even if it's to the convenient store in town.

Again, thanks to all for the prayers and well wishes!

Like yelling "Fire!" in a crowded movie house

2006-08-04T21:51:00.000-05:00

I may just park myself here and watch Spaces burn to a lump of molten silicone. I'll let you know...