The Devil and My Muse

Family Vacation (Cica 1975)

2010-07-02T10:49:00.005-04:00

A co-worker and I recently had a discussion about old school family vacations. The kind where you take to the open road with the family and drive to a destination, perhaps the long way. I started feeling very nostalgic for this type of vacation.

When I was a kid, my father would take every minute of vacation time and spend six weeks in the summer driving his "camping rig" to Ohio from San Diego, CA. We would take 14 days to get there, spend a week visiting the grandparents and assorted aunts and uncles then drive back.

We roamed all over the western U.S. and saw many of the major sites between the west coast and Ohio. The week before the big trip, dad would crank the old camper onto the truck and prepare the equipment for the long ride. Good tires, belts, hoses, secure hardware for the camper etc. The day before the trip was spent loading food, clothing, toys, games, all the things one would need for an extended stay in a camper. Potable water was pumped into the holding tanks and ice for the "ice box" (needed block ice, try finding that these days) was secured. My two sisters and me would spend the night in the camper that night, high adventure for a bunch of kids, and by the time we awoke in the morning we would be watching the sunrise through the camper window over the California desert, heading east.

This was way before cell phones, so we had the ubiquitous CB radio fired up and tuned to channel "one nine" to monitor road conditions or call for help if needed. Dad had an 8 track player but it only played through the one speaker in the dash, AM radio was the only other form of entertainment. Dad drove, mom sat in the "navigator seat" and three kids rode in back. The rear window of the truck popped out and was connected to the camper with a "boot" a vinyl pass through that served to allow access from the cab to the rest of the camper. I recall countless boring miles perched facing forward on the dinette seat of the camper watching the western landscape roll by.

Us kids would play games, sleep, fight (but only till dad threatened to pull over). I remember spending a great deal of time being motion sick from the ride. I can even recall great sites we visited based on how sick I was when we got there. For instance, Meteor Crater in Winslow Arizona, sick, threw up in the visitor parking lot, Mt. Rushmore SD. same thing, only I made it to the bathroom at the visitor center that time (ahh air conditioning). I remember hearing rattlesnakes along the path to the restrooms at a rest stop in Gila Bend Arizona and countless summer evenings at "KOA Kampgrounds" along the interstate, hoping for a pool and praying dad would let us swim.

These summer trips in the '70's were the ultimate adventure. I saw mountains and desert, plains and canyons, sea and sky. When finally we arrived at our destination in southwest Ohio it was like visiting mars. These were my dads brothers and sisters, my grandparents, and they lived in a culture that was very different than the suburban life I lived in San Diego. Dad eventually moved us all back to Ohio permanently, but these expeditionary missions across the country gave me not only a taste of what our lives would someday be, but exposed me to the concept that the world did not end at the county line.

Today, vacation means driving to the North Carolina beaches, only 11 hours or flying to a destination and staying in a hotel. I wouldn't dream of driving across the western deserts and mountains without a cell phone, nor would I be able to take an entire month off work and spend a large portion of it driving. All those years ago however, what we did was fairly normal and the experience and lessons have stayed with me all this time. The next time I am 30,000 feet in the air, going west in a flying silver tube, I will look down at the roads I once traveled, in a hot camper, motion sick as hell and remember feeling excited to be moving, going somewhere surrounded by my family and enjoying the most American of vacations.

A tearless day

2010-02-09T15:03:00.007-05:00

My First Tearless Day
F-C-G- Possibly Am. Haven't got that far yet.

If just one gray old day went by
When thoughts of you didn't make me cry
If just one golden dawn could break
When with tears I did not wake

If just one slow ,sad song could play on the radio

That didn't cause me to weep, for wanting you so

I would celebrate, healing, saying so long
no more confusion, hurt and barley hanging on.

I would count my first blessing, since you went away
And I would celebrate.. my first tearless day.

If only I could get through
24 hours without thinking of you
Not remembe - ring all the good times we had
and even some of the bad

If I could forget my life being ripped apart
I might get to keep a little piece of my heart

I would celebrate, healing, saying so long
no more confusion, hurt and barley hanging on.

I would count my first blessing, since you went away
And I would celebrate.. my first tearless day.

I miss her so dearly, the tear stains on my face
I want her so badly my smile is out of place
The whiskey and the cigarette smoke
Are just not enough to give me hope

If I could just have one sunny afternoon
When my tears do not stain my eyes so soon.

I would celebrate, healing, saying so long
no more confusion, hurt and barley hanging on.

I would count my first blessing, since you went away
And I would celebrate.. my first tearless day.

Love don't live there anymore, and neither do I

2010-02-07T21:21:00.002-05:00

I recently had to move out of my home of two years. My girlfriend and I broke up, just for the record it was her idea. Since it was her house, out I went. I once swore that I would never co-habitate with a woman again unless it was my house. Obviously that vow went unobserved. I loved her then and I love her now. I enjoyed being close to her everyday and adjusted to living with her pretty well. There were good times, mostly good times really. I am still not entirely certain what happened.

Probably the saddest sentence to pass my lips recently was "I don't live there anymore". Just like that I am gone, possessions moved, lease signed, new home, new neighborhood. The apartment is comfortable, I quickly started making it feel like home. But it is not home, home was where my girl and I lived and laughed and loved. Home is where I made plans to improve the landscape and finish the basement. Home is where my former lover and I talked about the future, a future together.

We decided not to burn any bridges this time around. I think we both feel like there was enough special and good about our time together, that throwing it all away seems a bit extreme, and sad. Surely there is something to save from that time. But I do not get to live there any longer, and I miss her most of all but I also miss the creaky basement stairs, the morning light in the windows, the garden and yard. I miss my former bed, the one with her in it.

This blog has "love" in the tagline, part of the content. So here we go, my 'readers' get treated to the play by play of getting over yet another love, learning to live in a new neighborhood, gritting my teeth and working through putting my life back together. I have done this before, so I am pretty good at it by now. I just wish I was home right now, the former home, the one I didn't want to leave, the one I miss, because the one I miss the most lives there, but I don't live there anymore.

Wildwood - Music Done Right

2009-11-16T21:03:00.005-05:00

I probably played over 50 guitars in the six months since I decided I was going to have my dream guitar. My Martin is a fabulous instrument, but I found it difficult to play and uncomfortable in my hands. What I really wanted was a guitar that felt like an extension of my somewhat less than talented hands. My Ovation felt great to play, it was forgiving with just the right neck, but it could not produce the sound I was looking for.

Thus started my quest for a new guitar. I didn't much care what it cost, I would save up for it and wait as long as needed. I really just wanted to finally own a fine guitar that was just right for me.

Quality guitar shops in my area are getting few and far between. I would never purchase a guitar from the big boys, Guitar Center is too big and unfeeling. I wanted someone to sell me a guitar that was knowledgeable about the product, had some experience to share regarding finding the perfect guitar and if I had questions or a problem I wanted to be able to find that person and discuss it in person. Not some huge corporate behemoth that really didn't care about me or my purchase.

I visited all the guitar shops within a 60 mile radius, some stocked nice guitars others didn't have the first high end instrument on the wall. I already owned a Martin, those are not hard to find, I wanted something different in a smaller size. I researched all the brands meticulously and decided to try Breedlove, Taylor and Larrivee. I played many models of all three brands, only finding one that was close. A Breedlove OMM Revival.

One day while at a small store on the south side of Columbus, a store with NO high end guitars in stock, I asked where I might find a good selection of nice guitars. The helpful gentleman seemed apologetic, maybe even sad, but he explained that he could only stock what he could sell and that the high end models didn't move fast enough. He suggested that I visit Wildwood Music.

I immediately drove home and started researching this place, Wildwood Music. It had a bit of a mystique about it, apparently guitarists from miles around drive to this small town and visit the store. They indeed had a nice selection of Martins, Larrivee's and Taylors. We made plans to drive the 100 miles to the store the next weekend.

I compiled a list of models I wanted to try and was as prepared as I have ever been to get exactly what I wanted. I did bring the check book, just in case I found the perfect guitar but resolved to let it wait if there was any doubt. We were greeted by the owners of the store, Marty and Don. They were super friendly and knew just what questions to ask and Don listened intently as I described what I was looking for. There was an unhurried atmosphere, and I did not feel like I had to buy anything in order to get this priceless personal service.

We were there about three hours, I played a dozen guitars or more. As I tried one out, Don would come over with another and ask some more questions. It was almost like a personal assistant, trying to professionally guide the buying process. I enjoyed it immensely. What fun, getting my hands on all of these expensive, high quality guitars.

I kept coming back to a Larrivee OMV50 with a soft Venitian cut away and the perfect neck. The guitar was also beautiful with mother of pearl abalone inlay as the rosette and many more features like maple binding and a gorgeous Brazilian Mahogany. The top is Sitka spruce, actually from Sitka Alaska. I could go on forever, but the guitar is exactly what I had been searching for. However, I was not going to buy it that day.

Don mentioned that Larrivee is no longer going to produce the "10" series OM's, thus making the guitar I liked the best suddenly unavailable. With that knowledge I went ahead and bought the thing, put it in layaway and three weeks later went up and got it. I own it now and I must say it is a dream. The staff at Wildwood Music have got it right, I am sure what they do is very labor intensive, but the effect was that I bought a guitar and would happily recommend this store and this wonderful couple to anyone. They also sell banjo's and dulcimers. The store is in historic Old Roscoe Village near Coshocton.

If more music stores were like this one, I imagine fewer of them would be closing their doors. There is no substitute for great product AND great people.

Wildwood Music

Hot Dogs 'N Whiskey

2009-09-11T22:15:00.003-04:00

We enjoyed hot dogs for dinner this evening. We washed them down with Whiskey. I had several nice Bourbons during the course of the evening.

Wild Turkey 101, Knob Creek (90 proof), Makers Mark, all mixed with as my friend Pete would say "good Bourbon, good Ice, good Coke".

The punchline is actually the build up to this dinner. Last night I knew we would have my daughter and probably a guest. I knew we didn't have much to eat in the house. I looked around and saw that we had 2 1/2 packs of bun length hot dogs, a can of baked beans and some buns. Thus hot dogs 'n whiskey was born.

We grilled out and enjoyed the hell out of a gorgeous summer evening and dined on Oscar Mayer and Van De Kamp. Mmmmm.

Just goes to show, even hot dogs are fancy if you are drinking top shelf Bourbon.

Maybe tomorrow I will skip the hot dogs and just have the Bourbon.

The People Want This - Warning: Tech Content

2009-08-12T07:27:00.003-04:00

In my job I am partially responsible for vetting new projects, consulting on ROI and generally helping with the tech aspects of a new project. I gain an understanding of the business logic with all the stakeholders, then report what it will take in terms of programming, design, and maintenance to make it happen. There are endless meetings where we brainstorm new ideas, or look for ways to implement a new feature. There are other meetings where we look to the past and review what ideas are working and which ones are not. These are all common tasks for a project manager.

What has been bothering me lately however is the blind thrust of certain stakeholders to develop and deploy projects without the first clue as to actual user demand, or more importantly the Return on Investment. I hear it frequently, "a lot of people are looking for (fill in the blank)". Really? Are you sure? If my team and I move forward on this (fill in the blank) project we will be committing hours, time away from other projects, fees, payments and ongoing maintenance that we will have to budget for. Did you really do any research on this or are you simply stabbing in the dark on this one.

Here is an example, I recently had on of my freelance clients complain about the way his photo gallery worked. It is a simple affair on an inexpensive website. Just click on an image and the image will pop up and display the larger version for better viewing. I did not code new pages for each individual image, just a few simple lines of JavaScript that will display the image in a window. Since there was not an actual html page to edit, there was no way to show text or provide a "close window" button. He was unhappy about the lack of a "close window" link and stated in very blunt terms: "..there are many people that wont know to click the 'x' to close the window.." Wow, in today's world if someone is looking at his website and doesn't know to click the 'x' then we all have problems.

He had no empirical evidence, no statistics, no clue whatsoever if his statement was actually true, only that he himself felt that clicking the 'x' was too arcane an operation for most computer users to comprehend. Thus, I had to spend another hour coming up with a solution that both satisfied his odd demand and didn't break my time budget. This happens all the time in meetings at my real job too. I hear one old salt, who is a bit backwards when it comes to tech, always bleating about some odd item "people want". How does he know what people want? He deals in a fairly narrow level of expertise and to forever hear that the "people want this" just drives me up a wall. So assume for a moment he is correct, that means 200 people want it? 1000 people want it? Show me the evidence, the demographics, proof from others that do have the feature.

Second guessing what your audience wants in a web application is not a good way to conduct business. Sure, one reason I have a job is to satisfy the whims of management, but in today's economy when we are all doing more with less, I want to see some hard data before I make my team start on a project that will have minimal returns. Take the time to actually learn what "the people want" then track those metrics and confirm the hours spent were worth the effort.

New Blog

2009-07-08T20:53:00.003-04:00

This blog isn't done, by any means. I have a hundred things to blog about. However my attention is going into a little project of mine. Check it out at barflychronicles.com. I will have more posts over here eventually. I promise.
Phresh~

Oh.. we found that was actually one of the best things for you.

2009-03-28T22:57:00.004-04:00

In the Woody Allen film, Sleeper, there is a scene were a groggy Rumpelstiltskin Woody is asked if he wants a scotch and a cigarette. He says no, that those things (especially the smoke) are bad for his health. This is when the futurist says (paraphrase) "Oh no we have discovered that scotch and a smoke are one of the best things you can do for your body" the conversation goes on about how 20th century man suffered because they thought they couldn't drink and smoke.

Well I wish that were the case, it is no longer the 20th century but I believe smoking is probably really bad for you in the doses that I engage in the habit. Scotch on the other hand while being only palatable in the rarefied air of single malts is still OK to imbibe in. That is in the doses I normally take of Scotch Whiskey.

I am a pack a day smoker, I have been a smoker for well over 20 years. I once quit for 24 months almost to the day and when I picked them back up I knew what I was doing. I fully understood I was about to re ignite my addiction and let it run part so my life again. The trauma that precipitated that decision is beyond the scope of this post, but tobacco was one of the first crutches I reached for.

Daisy is going to quit, in the face of aging, and a steep increase in the cost of smoking in my state she has decided to make the attempt to quit. I will follow, and also make the attempt, we live together and love each other and should share this burden in order to support each other and increase our chances of success.

I must say I don't want to quit, I mean I want to be free of my addiction but that is a scary proposition. I really love them, the way I feel when I smoke the romance and social aspects of smoking are all very entrenched in my psyche. I have had some health issues as of late, and they were quite unpleasant. None of these issues were a result of my nicotine habit, but what if they were? I hated my recent stay in the hospital, what if I fail to quit and someday have to spend the last of my days in a hospital where the technology to keep me breathing exists? A powerful reminder as to why my smoking days are numbered.

I have had free reign at work for smoking, I go outside to smoke 5 times in an 8 hour period. I take 7 minutes to go downstairs, have a smoke and come back. There was an ashtray directly outside the south entrance. The South entrance is used by the janitorial staff, construction and maintenance staff, the employees in the know that use the entrance as a back door, up the steps, not a grand entrance via wood paneled elevator.

This past week the ashtray left, it is gone. I asked the maintenance man what the deal was. Turns out the new tenanants of the building (well over 100 employees) sent many complaints to the property manager about smokers in front of the south entrance. What the fuck people? Take the East entrance and leave me alone. I cant have my own space to engage in a perfectly legal activity? There are 4 main entrances into the building and "mine" is near the diesel generator and the dumpster, the least convenient and most service like of all the ways into the building. Yet now folks have nothing better to do than start up an email campaign to end my ability to smoke outside.

I guess the point is moot, since with a bit of luck, I will be a non smoker someday soon. However, I imagine even as a non smoker I will not approve of war on a legal activity engaged in during a legitimate break. What fools, I have often said, if there is one thing worse than a smoker it is a reformed smoker. Well not me, I will quit becuase I want to live. In my heart I will always be a smoker and will support those who have not yet mustered the courage to quit. Believe me, every smoker in the universe knows it is bad for them and want to quit someday. They do not need anyone to point it out or cajole them into stopping. It is a personal decision and one they will all have to make someday or suffer the consequences.

I no longer say to my peers that I am going to quit smoking, what I say is I am going to try. I have tried so many times and failed, it is shameful and embarassing when I triumphantly announce that I have quit yet a few days or weeks later I end up smoking agian. The best I can do is try. And try I will, wish me luck.

Therapy Animals

2009-03-09T17:36:00.006-04:00

Ahh, at home resting comfortably. That is a blessed thing today, being able to eat regular food, albeit bland food, and sleeping in my own bed. Being able to take a hot shower at will and wear actual pants. The ability to watch what I want on television in my own recliner. These are precious things that I have been missing.

I was recently hospitalized for an emergency case of Pancreatitis caused by gall stones. I subseqently lost said organ to the surgeons knife and I am now recovering. I have very little experience with hospitals or modern health care as I have enjoyed a healthy life up till now.

While lying in my fairly uncomfortable hospital bed one afternoon during the ordeal, I hear a commotion from the other side of the curtain. Arriving to make my day are an older couple in some sort of uniform, carrying a dog. I didn't want to see the mutt, I don't like dogs much and I was also very grumpy. However, Daisy wanted to see what the deal was, so into the room come the couple with their "Therapy" dog.

Turns out these people volunteer to walk the wards of hospitals and spread cheer with thier terrier-like mutt "Gabby the Therapy Dog". The animal was wearing one of those knitted sweaters that people put on dogs. I mentioned that I was a cat person and on que "Gabby" was prompted to growl a fake growl at the notion of cats.

I wasn't cheered up at all by the "Therapy Dog" that was until I thought about the opposite, what about a "Therapy" cat? No that wouldnt work. The cat would not like being carried around and they do not growl on command, or anything else for that matter. At best the cat would look at a sick person with total ambivalence, at worst the animal would wish you were dead so it could eat your liver.

So we must reject the notion of a therapy cat. If they really wanted to cheer me up during my stay in the hospital the could have sent around "Bambi the Therapy Stripper" now that would have been theraputic!

Music Review - Royksopp

2008-12-28T10:03:00.002-05:00

You know the Geico commercial, there the caveman is on one of those "people movers" at an airport. The actor is casually looking at his boarding pass and is obviously on vacation when he notices a billboard with the "so easy a cave man can do it" commercial. The song in the background is Royksopp singing "Remind Me". Turns out this electronic / ambient band has many songs appearing in advertising including Apple.

Melody AM is an older cd of thiers, it is classed in a niche genre of music called "Chill". Even the name of this album is a reference to a time of day, where after spending the entire night at a sweaty rave, eating estacy tabs and drinking vodka mixed with redbull, you are finally able to relax and come down from the evenings escapades.

Indeed, the songs on this cd are perfect for chilling out, a sonic balm of sorts but with interesting hooks and bold electronic beats. I think of it as batchelor music, I envision modern furniture and martini glasses, maybe a mobile hanging from the ceiling, and large coffee table books featuring black and white photos of obscure European art.

I like this sort of electronic music, having been a big fan of ambient styles for a long time. This album of tunes would work well in a party situation, and it works well as background music for nearly any situation when one has to chill out. There are no real stand out songs, just put it in the player and let it roll.

Excellent CD, I will be buying more Royksopp in the future. I give it 4 out of 5 stars.

Enjoy~

Lots of New Music - Music Review

2008-12-23T17:41:00.005-05:00

About every two months or so I go on a music buying binge. I sit down over the course of a couple of evenings with Itunes and a credit card and seek out music that I have heard about and music that I just wish to explore. Usually, I have not actually listened to any of it, so I take the risk of getting a dog now and then, but there is a thrill purchasing music sight unseen (sound unheard?).

Recently I bought a bunch of new music. Most of it is good, some of it is exceptional. I decided to review my new albums on my blog, keeping with the tradition of Phresh's music review in the sidebar.

Everything that Happens, Happens Today - David Byrne and Brian Eno

Being a fan of both David Bryne (Talking Heads) and Brian Eno (Roxy Music), I thought this might be worth a listen. The album was also featured on NPR's "All Songs Considered". I am now on my 6th full listen and I am liking it more each time I play it.

The songs reflect David Byrne's quirky yet sophisticated pop sensibility with Brian Eno's genius for production and electronic vibe. The music does indeed have echoes of experimental music from Eno days gone by, but it is not all electronic, in fact, the electronic ambience is quite restrained.

This album is danceable and just a good jam, Bryne works out his signature vocals on several songs with that trademark crecendo. There is alot of good energy in this collection as well, perfect for driving, or a party, it sounds good with headphones.

On "Home" we enjoy interesting lyrics and a great pop melody, backed up with some guitars and a rhythem of industrial sounding loops, it works well. As the song plays, there is a familiarity, almost predictable, then Byrne sings an unexpected note at the last minute creating a very listenable and original sound.

The title track "Everything that Happens, Happens Today" stars with a melodic episode of up front piano and rich synths that lead to Byrne's vocals. The tune features David Byrnes signature lyrics, sung with very "Headesque" inflection.

The only Klinker in my opinion is "Poor Boy" which starts out a bit dischordant and tries to hard with experimental themes.

The album plays as a solid and contiguous work, very entertaining and an easy listen without being boring. I give it 4 out of 5, worth the money.

Go get a copy of "Everything that Happens, Happens Today" and enjoy.
Phresh~

Using the Force to Cut Steak in Style - The Jedi Steak Knife Set

2008-11-27T09:32:00.007-05:00

"Never underestimate the power of dark meat"

Serve your next piece of charred meat in style with our new Jedi Steak Knife set. Table service will never be the same with our "guaranteed to cut" knife set. "Do or do not, there is no try" in truer now than ever. Steak a little tough? No problem, with the Jedi Steak Knife nothing is ever too much to cut again.

Our elegant set of four Jedi Knives will have you saying goodbye to the Ginsu forever. Severing a steel pipe, melting a blast door or sending your sons hand to oblivion is no match for our knives, you will still be able to slice a tomato with ease!

This 5 inch Jedi steak knife set compliments any Jedi's dinner table, comes in handy for melting cheese on fondu night as well.

Made of unspecified otherworldly materials the knifes use the Power of the Force to stay sharp at all times. No more dull knives! Shipped direct to you from our factory on Dagoba, you will receive your set in hyperspeed.

Users report nothing but glowing sentiments when it comes to this unique product. Reggie N. in Duluth writes: "My Jedi Steak Knife set arrived today and already cutting my meat has never been easier. I get a big kick out of the powerful "swooshing" sound each time I slice off a delectable piece of savory steak."

Agnes P. from Houston wrote in with this testimonial:" I accidentally cut my finger while trying to cut the last bit of goodness from around my T-bone. I used the Jedi knife to instantly cauterize my wound, my guests didn't even know I was bleeding on the asparagus."

As you can see this set is not only beautiful but highly useful as well. Other popular uses include
using as a flashlight, cigarette lighter, fine metal cutting and soldering. Many users find the knife useful as a letter opener.

Get your set today.

*Same day shipping by Imperial Cruiser available.

** Most orders shipped by scruffy smuggler, please allow 4-6 weeks for delivery.

**Extra Metachlorians sold separately.

Here is some good news....but

2008-09-14T08:59:00.002-04:00

Yet another rant about my good friends at National Public Radio. NPR is the only way to get the news and insight that I crave on my long commutes to and from work. Even though the attitude of the entire organization is decidedly liberal and a bit elitist. I overlook the left leaning spin and glean a good bit of actual news and analysis from the stories.

Lately however; I have started yelling at my radio again, all by myself in the car. The inanity of some of the comments just leave me wondering what people do all day if they have time to be worried about such minutia.

Here is my latest dilemma, I am sick to death of listening to a story that has one outcome, and then hearing how that outcome will negatively affect something or someone, no matter how positive the story is. Here is a fictitious example.

News reader: "The 2.6 million dollar clean coal plant will be built in a small town in West Virginia bringing good paying jobs to an economically depressed region. Plant officials estimate 5000 jobs will be created, making this a boom for the entire economy of an otherwise depressed area.

(All positive so far, jobs for poor people)." News reader continues: "However, a rare bird, the West Virginia Blue Tit lives on the same mountainside as the proposed plant construction site. The small bird has suffered habitat loss in the past and the construction of this plant could endanger the species. Local Audobon Society representatives say the plant should not be built due to the risk of harming the already frigile eco system."

So while this example is fiction and was never really reported, it is emblamatic of the type of reporting I hear all day on NPR. There is ALWAYS a caveate no matter how small or how trivial it may be. In my mind, you cannot have it both ways. Either the poor and downtrodden of a rural area suddenly get really good jobs boosting the local economy, or we save an obscure bird. Which is it, becuase I know for a fact that if the plant in the story were not built because of environmental issues, the story would have been about the poverty and hopelessness of the people involved.

I hope most Americans live, work and go about thier lives with not so much angst about every little thing. Most of us have learned that you cannot please everyone. When did the needs of the few start outweighing the needs of the many? When did policy and planning start including the obscure and the minor at the expense of the good of the many? In a way, this type of attitude is both condescending and elitist and I am sick of it. The little bird will find somewhere else to live and the plant will be built helping thousands of people who had little hope of gaining good jobs. Sounds like a good thing to me. There are enough worthy things to be concerned about in this life without manufactuing angst over some of the details. People as well as nature are more adaptable than we are getting credit for, including the blue tits.

Daddy LOVES his Caddie

2008-07-04T08:55:00.002-04:00

After months of silence, the first new blog post of the summer is about the Cadillac..again. I truly love my car, even though it is older, it still looks really good. The Catera is low slung, has a cool looking front front end, if I pop the moon roof the cars profile oozes sophisticated sportiness.
I try very hard to take care of my car, the oil get changed religiously, I recently hand washed and waxed the thing under the tree in the backyard. I want the car to last and to continue running well, making my long commutes like spending time in my living room swaddled in soft leather luxury.

While driving to work not long ago, I noticed the "check engine" light was on. Just for perspective, I have owned many high mileage cars, so the "check engine" light typically does not intimidate me. I once drove a Cavalier (loved that old car) for four years with the check engine light on. Hell, if it went off is when I would get nervous. Mostly this light is just a means of getting you into the dealership so they can sell you some obscure part that costs too much, oh and while you are there why not spend hundreds of dollars on other maintenance items that happen to need fixed too.

This time however, I was not content to just let it pass, I couldn't stand seeing the light on the dash, a constant reminder that my beloved Cadillac might be sick. As I drove I carefully tuned into the vehicles performance. I turned off the radio and the A/C and listened for anything out of the ordinary. I put the car through some different driving conditions to determine if anything was out of place. As it turns out there were no obvious differences in the way the car behaved. Just the glowing reminder that something might be wrong.

Later the same day, as I drove home from work, I called the Cadillac dealer in my town to inquire about getting the light checked out. The next day I drove into the service bay at the dealership to have the mysterious light analyzed.

Now, the Cadillac dealership service bay isn't like the Chevy or Saturn service areas. This place looked like the workshop for a NASCAR drivers car. Clean, modern, the staff were extremely friendly and professional. In the past I have had negative feelings about all things dealer, especially the service department but this time I was impressed. I was Mr. Freshour, and I felt that my car would get the finest service available from these clean and professional service people.

The paper work was done in moments and I was ushered into a service lounge. The lounge featured high end leather seating, a large flat panel television and deep cold air conditioning. I settled into a chair and picked up a very recent copy of GQ while I awaited the prognosis on my car. The test was supposed to take an hour but only 30 minutes later the very nice service man sat down next to me with a computer print out that contained the diagnosis. He explained what needed to happen and why, he also pointed out the long term consequences of ignoring the light.
I agreed and an hour later I was back on the road. The repair was a vacuum pump that had gotten old and no longer worked to spec. There were also some hoses that had dry rotted and no longer held air.

I do not understand everything about a cars vacuum system, I know on older models the compression from the cylinders created vacuum pressure and this was harnessed to advance the timing as well as a host of other vital functions, but newer cars are all "fly by wire" with electronics controlling most of a vehicles operations. I also know that larger cars rely on vacuum assist to enhance vehicle performance. Sure enough, the slightly anemic air conditioning was blowing robustly again, I had more break pedal, and the car idled more smoothly. All small and subtle things, but I was happy. Mostly, I was glad the light was no longer advertising the fact I had to go to the dealer and spend money.

The repair was not cheap, but I did get a 10% discount for being a first time customer. I got an oil change punch card, so every 5th oil change is free. I also gained a trust for the service department, I would not go anywhere else now. I will pay a bit extra for the Cadillac service, all because these people have not forgotten that the customer is king.

The Ultimate Condiment

2008-05-03T21:54:00.002-04:00

Readers of this blog know that I have been on a diet these last few months. It has worked very well so far. I eat a lot of Splenda, and am amazed at the vast universe of flavors that can be coaxed out of the humble turkey. I have satirized diet foods in the past, including the weird spray on butter substitute endorsed by Fabio.

While contemplating what special needs a man has while dieting,
it occurred to me that men only need a simple condiment to lose weight. If everything tasted like bacon, we could easily eat brussels sprouts, broccoli, oddly colored "baby" lettuce, even spinach. Our entire dietary intake could be high fiber leafy greens with usually flavorless yellow squash. Imagine how fast the pounds would fly off.

Yes, I propose the wonder condiment, "I Can't Believe It's Not Bacon....Spray". Whip up a heaping plate of green beans and with a few simple sprays they suddenly taste like they have been cooking in bacon fat for hours, just like mom used to make! Think of the millions of dollars the inventor of this miracle condiment would make. Other uses for our amazing new spray on food would include bacon low fat smoothies, bacon sandwiches with only lettuce and tomato, unnatural eggs in a carton with the bacon flavor cooked in. I can't wait to write the "I Can't Believe It's Not Bacon" cook book.

Forget celery with peanut butter, just a few good sprays of this stuff and it would be like eating pork rinds, crunchy goodness and all. The possible uses for this wonder spray are endless and enticing. For the hard core bacon lover, it would be possible to drink the stuff right out of the bottle, for an intense bacony rush of goodness just pour into a shot glass and enjoy, neat.

I will keep scanning the grocery store shelves for the holy grail of diet foods, searching for bacon on demand without the guilt (or the fat and calories). Look for "I Can't Believe It's Not Bacon...Spray" at a store near you.

It Ain't Easy Peeing Green

2008-04-19T08:16:00.002-04:00

So being "green" is all the rage these days. All we hear in the media is how to conserve, save, recycle and if we don't then we are obviously bad, bad people. Companies are jumping on the green bandwagon in record numbers, most are just using it as a promotional tool. Sending me junk mail on recycled paper does not really qualify as being environmentally sound to me. At least the company that is sending me the advertising can put a cool logo on the mailer stating how green they are.

We, as a society are encouraged daily to conserve, save gas, save electricity, save water, don't pollute unnecessarily. I keep hearing how the world is facing a water shortage. I can see that in the desert parts of the world (like California and Texas) but where the most recent problem has been is in the American South, like Georgia. I am from California originally, where folks have been using "low-flow" toilets and "gray water irrigation" for years. I suppose a water shortage comes as a bit of a surprise in an area normally known for being very moist.

It occurred to me recently that I use a ton of water for flushing the commode. On a good drinking night I imagine I flush a hundred gallons or more down the drain. I therefore have decided to pee green. I don't mean that I plan on eating tons of green substances, or take some medication that will make my pee a nice shade of chartreuse. I am suggesting a return to the outhouse. That quaint shack built over a ditch in the back yard. Then all my waste would simply gurgle into a ditch where it could decompose naturally. No water used at all. All men could do their part by simply whipping it out and peeing behind the garage, anytime. No water, no flushing, no paper products used. Public decency laws could be changed to when the guys are out at the bar, drinking, a quick trip to the alley in back of the place could serve as the green pee area.

With this idea I have done my part to save the earth. I bet peeing green would save tens of thousands of gallons of water each year. If every man did this (yes the ladies are exempted for now) we could float Georgia with the water saved. Of course alleys and the back of garages may end up looking like some back street in Bombay. But what is a little odor and disease if we are saving the worlds water supply? If growing corn to make fuel is a green action to take, even though now there is a global food shortage, then peeing green to save water, even though the gutters may run foul with waste, cant be a bad thing, right?

Now I am making a difference, something has finally come along that I can do. I am not going to buy a Prius, nor am I going to use canvas bags at the grocery store. I doubt I am going to start using an electric lawn mower, and our town does not even offer a recycling program as part of trash pick up, so peeing green is my small contribution to saving our planet.

It is easy peeing green after all.

I Can Tell In Your Face

2008-03-27T20:09:00.003-04:00

I have lost some weight in the last six months, 15 lbs in just the past five weeks. I have dropped a pant size, and I feel better. I still have a long way to go, but the diet I am on isn't too hard and there is no reason to believe I will fail. I am craving pizza really bad these days though, some foods are hard to give up.

My girlfriend can tell where I have lost weight, but she has access to my body and a certain intimacy that others do not. I love it when she notices, it makes me smile. Still, it would be nice if others started noticing my weight loss. When I proudly announce that I have lost 30 lbs. since last Labor Day, I get the usual accolades and that is cool, but what I really want is an unsolicited comment. How about "wow Scott you are looking sveldt these days" or maybe "have you lost weight? You look fabulous".

Alas I get nothing of the sort, instead what I hear is "I can tell you have lost weight in your face". Thats great, I wasn't worried about my face, I am worried about my ass. Will you tell me when you can see that I have lost weight in my ass? "Egads, Scott, your ass is nearly gone! Good work!". It is the bane of every fat guy who ever went on a diet, I have been there many times actually. I lose weight in my face, so I have a 16 lbs. head instead of an 18 lbs. head. That is fabulous. Maybe my old hats will fit better. Here is an idea, I can now get a smaller fucking dew rag. Oh and what do you mean when you say you can tell in my face? Does that mean you never look at my ass? Good, just as well you keep it that way I suppose, but really, it would be nice to get some validation on the other body parts that are rapidly shrinking into much smaller sizes.

Today was the first day I added exercise to my diet, yes the fat man went to the gym. It was pretty fun, there were the usual cliques of weight lifters, getting all buff and built, I wonder how many are 'roiding after the workout. There were mostly working folk, people like me who sit on their previously fat asses (not that anyone notices) and stare at a computer screen all day. If it weren't for the 40 minutes at the Y, most office bound Americans would move less than a three toed sloth. I sat on a bike for 15 minutes, the read out said I had burnt 70 calories. Let's see, 70 calories is about the equivalent of a quarter of a slice of pepperoni pizza pie. The math makes my head spin, if I ever want to eat again I will have to spend all of my free time at the gym.

I spent some time on the elliptical machine, some weird contraption that is like a bike but you "pedal" with your arms, then I did some traditional weight training. See, I want a big upper body to counter act by big lower body.

Mostly, I can not help but compare the equipment in the gym to ancient torture devices. There are machines there that even look like The Rack. All of them are a form of torture too, because I have been home for all of two hours and I am already stiff and sore. I am sure the morning will feel even more like I have spent time on the Rack. All that is missing is the little bald rat faced man with a lisp asking me to renounce my religion.

Yet I will willingly go back to my torture chamber on Saturday, because my diet and the American Heart Association say I must. Someday I may be able to actually enjoy the fruits of my labors, perhaps even have buns of steel, and then by god, you had better notice.

What Will Do For An Icon

2008-03-16T21:46:00.008-04:00

Well here we are 32 days since I posted the first post in my quest to write each day for 30 days. All of this to get an icon for my blog. I visited the site www.nablopomo.com and I cant find a badge that says 2008 on it. I will probably have to make my own.

I like to blog, and I intend to continue doing it for a long time. Do not however, look for a new post every night. Here is a summation of some loose ends I know I left hanging around in the past 30 days.

I came in second in the big Chili cook off, damn mid western taste buds did me in again.
The Cadillac is running fine.
I am so tired of the presidential primaries that I doubt I will write about them again. (Even though I promised a blog picking on Obama and Huckabee)
The diet is going well, I have lost 9 lbs eating fake butter.
Daisy is still the love of my life and she rocks. I hope to be a blogging superstar like her someday.
The cat still sleeps as much as ever and the comparisons to a three toed sloth have not abated.
The daughter that wrecked her car has recovered fully and is supposedly driving safely in my old Saturn.
Little cakes have come back into my life in the form of Weight Watchers snacks. 1 Point, Yay!
I am on schedule to get the new guitar out of lay away in May.
All I got out of the historic snow storm was half a day off from work and much of that was spent commuting on very icy roads.
I am still mildly obsessed with the weather, but summer weather is not as interesting.
All the snow is gone.
I still plan to write that long essay about CMS but of course by the time I get around to writing it, there will be a new technology to supplant it, and my thoughts will be irrelevant.

Till next time,
I am out of here.

The Pope Doesn't Speak for Me.

2008-03-15T01:47:00.003-04:00

I am not Catholic, therefore I can blaspheme the earthly incarnation of St. Peter if I want to, since I believe he is just a man after all. See what Sinead did for us all? Here is a basic difference as described by Monty Python.

Mr Blackitt: That's what being a Protestant's all about. That's why it's the church for me. That's why it's the church for anyone who respects the individual and the individual's right to decide for him or herself. When Martin Luther nailed his protest up to the church door in 1517, he may not have realised the full significance of what he was doing. But four hundred years later, thanks to him, my dear, I can wear whatever I want on my John Thomas. And Protestantism doesn't stop at the simple condom. Oh no! I can wear French Tickler if I want.

Mrs Blackitt: You what?

Mr Blackitt: French Ticklers... Black Mambos... Crocodile Ribs...Sheaths that are designed not only to protect but also to enhance the stimulation of sexual congress...

Mrs Blackitt: Have you got one?

Mr Blackitt: Have I got one? Well no... But I can go down the road any time I want and walk into Harry's and hold my head up high, and say in a loud steady voice: 'Harry I want you to sell me a *condom*. In fact today I think I'll have a French Tickler, for I am a Protestant...'

Mrs Blackitt: Well why don't you?

Ok since you all know how I feel about Catholicism I will move on to a the reason I am ranting about it today. See, in Europe (most notably Ireland) St. Patrick's day is a religious feast day, just like dozens of days associated with Easter and Christmas etc. Many of the days exist because, in antiquity, the only way to get the Godless heathens to convert was to super impose the pagan holiday they had always celebrated with goats blood and sex, onto a Christian historical event. Thus Christmas was celebrated on the solstice, when most pagans were sacrificing a virgin and erecting large rocks in alignment with the stars. So to get everyone to cooperate with the church, some pope said, "On this day Jesus was born" and a tradition was born. The same goes for Easter, and and many other feast days on the Catholic calendar.

Now I am not Knocking Catholics, hell, if I had to do it all over again I would be a Catholic instead of a Baptist. I mean the Catholics can at least drink and gamble with little thought of going to hell. As a Baptist I am certainly going to hell, just by virtue of writing this blog , let alone the fact that I often drink old wine and spirit's and am having carnal knowledge of my mate out of matrimony.

The reason I am pissing on the pope today is the fact that because there is an early Easter this year, Monday the 17th (St. Patrick's Day) has been officially moved to Saturday the 15th. Well this sort of screws with my Protestant plans for the day. See, a back sliding Baptist like myself has carefully planned a night of drunken abandon on the 17th. Up to and including subterfuge with my employer to get a work night to myself.

I think the non-Catholic world should totally ignore the Papal proclamation and rage like the apocalypse is already upon us in spite of the holy see's ideas. The fact that the feast day was officially moved suggests that the Vatican does not trust the parishioners to behave on a holy day. Yes,I understand it is Lenten, but my God man, no one gives up Guinness.

My John Thomas and I are going to rage and get in tune with our Irish heritage on Monday, the REAL St. Patrick's day, and we are going to have a good time doing it. I love not being obligated to listen to the pope. Steak next Friday anyone?

The Reason I Love St. Patrick's Day

2008-03-14T22:48:00.006-04:00

And the number one reason Phresh loves St. Patrick's Day is:

A.
B.
C.
I was at a family reunion recently, back in November actually. I learned some interesting things at this reunion. I learned that my paternal grandfather was adopted. That was quite a bombshell, since my understanding of my family lineage had been ingrained in me for many years. There have been questions, like who my biological grandfather was on my mothers side. That is a very sticky, messy subject that is beyond the scope of this blog post. I have thought for years however, that I had my fathers side of the family all figured out. I have been to the family cemetery and I have read the history book about our county and all the data I read pointed to German heritage on my grandfathers side and Irish heritage on my paternal grandmothers side.

While I have always managed to identify with my supposed German heritage, I have also wished I was more Irish, especially on St. Patrick's Day. I just understood the culture more intimately. I was happy being of German, Irish stock on my fathers side and English, Canadian on my mothers side. Like most Americans, I am a mix of many European cultures. From way back, as in the Revolution and prior.

So when I learned that my paternal grandfather was adopted, my interest was piqued. I have much yet to learn, but it turns out that he was of solid Irish decent. This makes sense to me on a fundamental level, he was a hard drinker till the day he died at a ripe old age, and seldom touched a beer. Black Velvet on the rocks was his poison of choice. A taste for whiskey is a good indication of heritage.

Liquor preference is only a minor thing though. My grandfather apparently was adopted in the pre-depression era by a German family. This boggles my mind and I really need to talk to the sole surviving member of his immediate family. My great aunt (his sister) lives still at the staggering age of 80 something. She is the last link, the last chance to learn what my lineage really is.

So now I have a clue to why a Catholic Irish holiday resonates so purely in my soul. I know, anyone who knows me understands that my favorite holidays are heavy drinking holidays, but there is so much more to it than that. I hope to learn what the real story is, and I am also hoping I am more Irish than originally thought. I could do worse.

Acronyms

2008-03-13T20:46:00.002-04:00

I work full time as the webmaster for a non profit organization that concerns itself with the world of ceramics. The organization publishes many books, one being an important scientific journal entitled: International Journal of Advance Ceramic Technology. We had, until this afternoon, a link on our website that read: "Member Access to IJACT". It has been there for over six months.
Today I get a rather breathless email from the director of journal publications telling me in a rather direct way to change the acronym as soon as possible. I didn't understand why at first. Then I read the acronym like a word. I Jacked.

My reply email was short but well thought out. "I will get IJACT off immediately.

Fun with words at work.

Warning: Tech Content

2008-03-12T22:25:00.002-04:00

CMS the Promise and the Peril.
That is the title of an essay I have been meaning to write for a long time. Back in '00 I was developing websites with a friend of mine and we found ourselves on the cutting edge of Content Management Systems development. At the time there were no good programs out there that would allow an admin with no code skills to update a web page. The premise is quite simple, extract programming from design, separate content from everything else. Thus, my pretty designs would not trip over a 1000 lines of code, the PHP wouldn't run into my markup, and the user could insert content independent of all the behind the curtain stuff.

What the user saw was a nice attractive interface, like the one I am typing in right now, just a box with some buttons that will affect minor markup changes, things like emboldening a line of text, or making something italicized, much like any word processor. When the user clicked save, what would publish on the public internet would be a page with the updated content. This is really quite a powerful capability. Think about a small business that has a staff of office workers, all perfectly capable of using MS Word or Word Perfect but not having a clue about HTML or FTP or servers. Instead of having to call the webmaster, wait for him/her to get around to making the changes, write said webmaster a check, they could login to a web interface and update the content themselves. This idea was a radical paradigm shift, and I was once in the fore front of making it happen.

Our CMS didn't get very far, we ran into the same road blocks everyone else did but we lacked the time, the finances and the will to keep pounding on the problems till we solved them. Over the years my team and I have produced three or four small systems and published them on live sites but by '02 there were many well developed and documented systems out there and most were, and remain, free.

I eventually decided that CMS was too powerful for the masses. My customers would call me to make changes, and I would login to the CMS console I built for them, and make the same changes they could have made without the need to send me money. I came to the conclusion that a good CMS would need to be brain dead simple in order for the average small business person to use it effectively. The problem was, the closer you got to the lowest common denominator, the less flexible the system becomes. There is probably a law of physics in that statement.

What I mean by that is this, I give Sally the receptionist the ability to login to a web interface and update the text on her home page. This works fine if all she can do is type some verbiage and maybe insert a photo in one small segment of the page. Maybe she wants to add a page, no problem, choose a template and build a new page. If one template is good enough, then once again we are not in trouble, but what if the home page template is not the same as the secondary pages? Now what happens when the navigation needs to be updated? do I give Sally the ability to add that too? So we make it dynamic, meaning we code some programming to allow the navigation to update automatically when a new page is created. What if the page does not warrant a place in the real estate set aside for it? So we create a way to choose if and when new content is placed in the navigation area. What happens when there are multiple navigation areas say across the top or beneath the header?

The complexity starts to boggle the mind, the possibilities are endless, and poor Sally now has to remember dozens of buttons and procedures to simply create a new page. We find ourselves in a position to limit what the user can do. Honestly, there is only so much power we can give to our receptionist, she doesn't know how the Wizard behind the curtain makes the pages, or the content change, all she knows is the boss wants the page updated by closing time.

Once we start limiting what the content editor can do, we also start to limit the flexibility of the program over all. The boss will want a calendar, or to change a color, or to add some nifty widget he saw on the competitions website and suddenly our CMS is diminished in it's practicality.

The promise of CMS was and to a certain extent still is, to allow the people that know the content actually publish the content without needing to know HTML. The peril is that less flexible websites will always fall behind in the market place. Where is the balance, the holy grail where the underlying API contains enough bells and whistles to make a CMS website both easy to use and able to meet the business logic needs of a company?

I could write for a very long time on this subject. I work with a large CMS at my job. It is starting to fulfill the purpose of it's intent in that we finally have department heads trained on the system well enough for them to do routine tasks each day. However; I am still called upon regularly to do something that the system just cant handle.

I think these systems get oversold. What company wouldn't jump at the chance to cut back or eliminate the Web staff, and let their current staff do the work instead. That is a basic business principle, get more work out of your staff for less money. It is similar to the siren song of MLM where the customers become your sales force etc. Why invest in trained sales people when you have given the customers the power to sell your product for you (AMWAY).

I have come to the conclusion that even with a good CMS there is still the need for a webmaster to do all the myriad tasks that the system was not designed to do. I guess that means I will have a job for awhile.

Little Cakes

2008-03-11T20:15:00.003-04:00

I have managed, through sheer will power and the grace of God to triumphantly proclaim.."I have got little cakes out of my life". Back on Labor Day I decided I was way too fat and I should make an effort to get some foods completely out of my diet. At first the list was really long, it included some of my favorite things too. The items on my banned list included full flavor beer, Wendy's double cheese burgers, sausage Mc Muffins with Egg and big greasy breakfasts at 4AM. Little cakes were on my list too, I love little cakes. Vanilla Zingers, King Dons, and of course Little Debbie's.

Good old Little Debbie is a regional snack that comes in single serving packages for a quarter. There are a plethora of different flavors to enliven one's sweet tooth. Some of my favorite varieties included Swiss Rolls, pecan pie, the crispy Star Crunch, Nutty Bars, and my all time favorite, Zebra Cakes. A couple of Zebra cakes and a Coke made for a breakfast of champions. The little cake was always easy to find, easy to afford and easy to eat in the car. After a long week of driving, there would always be dozens of little cake wrappers on the floor board.

I understand that today, the single size has risen to $.35 instead of a quarter, but back in the day a buck bought desert for the whole family. An entire box of these treats still sells for under two dollars. Of course there is a reason I am fighting to lose weight today, years and years of Little Debbie cakes (and Zingers, and that weird banana flavored taco thing).

All of the other foods on my banned list found their way back into my diet, although I consume them far less frequently today, but the little cakes are gone. I cannot remember the last time I enjoyed a Zebra Cake for breakfast (or lunch, or snack time). Someday when I have reached my target weight, and I am in "maintenance" I am looking forward to snagging a handful of delicious little cakes and having a nostalgic orgy of baked goodness.

I always knew Little Debbie was an evil trollop.

Where did St. Patricks Day Go?

2008-03-10T19:34:00.001-04:00

St. Patrick's day is my second favorite holiday. The fourth of July is my first with Christmas coming in a distant third. Yes I like Christmas but by the time it is over with, I can't help but feeling like it is about time and good riddance for another year.

For as long as I can remember I have taken the 18th of March off from work to recover from my Saint Paddies festivities. One year I actually pre-emptively called in sick. It was January and a couple of employees and myself were going over schedules for the coming months with the boss. I stated I needed March 18th off and my supervisor said no. I then said I was calling in sick that day and to go ahead and mark it in the calendar. She didn't understand what I was up to and was starting to get angry. I smiled and said, I was being pro-active and was calling in sick today in advance of March 18th. In exasperation, she finally asked how I knew I would be ill on that day. A buddy of mine had been listening and we both erupted into gales of laughter. Through tear blurred eyes and sporadic guffaws, I promised my boss that without any doubt whatsoever, I would be sick on 3-18. I waited for a few moments and then explained that it was the day after St. Patrick's day. It all became clear after that, and being the good person my boss was she took it well and laughed, but also said I couldn't have the day off. Needless to say, I was not there on March 18th.

In years past I made home made potato soup from scratch with real cream and butter. I cooked corned beef and cabbage and enjoyed Guiness and Harp and Bushmills. The night would usually be filled with bar hopping goodness and a drunken public sing along. I would stagger home festooned with cheesy green bead necklaces and other chachkis proclaiming one beer brand or another. The most inebriated I have been in my 41 years was on that special march day about 8 years ago. I was blind, literally, and probably should have died. That was a great St. Patrick's.

This year the Pope threw a monkey wrench in the works. Because Monday the 17th is a Holy day leading up to an early Easter this year (no I have never understood why Easter moves around so much) the Catholic church has decreed that this year St. Patrick's day will be on Saturday the 15th. Well I just learned this and I have already made careful plans to weave a drunken good time around my obligations to my employer. Half the fun is jetting early from work on St. Patrick's and pounding beers at 3 in the afternoon.

I can just have two celebrations, or go out on Saturday instead of Monday, but what if I go out on Monday and the bars are empty? What if I am the only one that stubbornly decided that St. Patrick's day should remain on the 17th. I must choose which day I am going out, I have made other plans for Saturday that involve my daughter and not drinking myself into a giggling, chatty oblivion. I must choose, but choose wisely.

I have some phone calls to make.

Business Casual

2008-03-09T20:34:00.002-04:00

The dishes had been done, the snow had been shoveled, other chores were completed and it was only noon. My morning had been productive to say the least.

Shoveling snow isn't something I had done in many years. It was fun, as memories of being 12 came floating out of the brilliant white sky. I was 12 years old in 1978, the last time I have seen this much snow in one place at one time.

I was resting my sore back but enjoying the feeling of having done some manual labor when Daisy asked if I wanted to go shopping. I hadn't planned on it really, yesterday our county and most of the neighboring counties were under a level 3 snow emergency, meaning you are subject to arrest if you do not have a compelling reason to be out on the roads. We have literally been snowed in for nearly 2 days so the thought of going somewhere sounded pretty good.

I thought I had dug my car out well enough move beyond the driveway but I was mistaken. I got stuck after having moved 2 feet. My big rear wheel drive Caddy didn't like the snow. After some more shoveling and some pushing (including a neighbors car that was also stuck in the alley) we got underway, in a sunny afternoon, snow and ice sparkling bright everywhere we looked. Fields blazing white in the late winter sun, smooth, deep, crisp and even.

My mission was to visit a K+G mens mart. This chain of mens stores had been advertising a promotion pushing mens No Iron shirts, buy one get one free. I need no iron shirts, since I don't have the time to iron and I suck at it. Daisy can iron a mans shirt quite well but she has no time either and it isn't her job to make sure I have pressed clothing.

Thus I am on a quest to buy a no-iron shirt. We follow the directions found on the website and drive through several neighborhoods to the store. As we drove we saw more urban squalor, the people were more ethically mixed, there were more car lots and strip clubs. I was getting a bad feeling about K+G mens mart. We pull into a parking lot and the storefront before me is giving me a dark vibe, I know the look, and it is not high end retail but more like a K-Mart in a bad neighborhood.

We go inside and visions of Value City are going through my head. For those of you that don't know, Value City is one of those aging department stores that sell faux high end clothing. Racks and racks of cloths under yellowing florescent lighting, weird signs on the walls stating the department. Three foot high plastic letters spelling out MENS etc. The clothing is "brand name" but the brands are pure de classe. Pierre Cardin? Jordache? Izod? Who wears Pierre Cardin these days. The brands sold out many years ago, to sweat shops in Indonesia and mass market mediocrity. If I wanted off the rack blandness I would have gone to Wal Mart. No I was looking for some nice clothes, and while I am always on the lookout for a good value, this stuff was just making me dizzy. The display in front of the store was showing a suit ensemble comprised of a white sport coat, white slacks and some fruity colored shirt. I would like to take this moment to mention I was the only white guy shopping there today.

Daisy made me take a look around but all I saw was faux class, not the real thing but a poor mans swank and glitter. Something a pimp would wear perhaps. We left soon after we arrived and drove to the Mens Warehouse. A crisp young man with a tape measure around his neck greeted us the moment we walked in and was a very big help. He measured me, gave me some advise about shirt sizes that I didn't previously know. Found 4 shirts in my size and extolled the virtues of them in a sensible way. I then mentioned I wanted a versatile and tasteful sport coat. Our nice salesman whisked me off to the racks of coats and instantly produced several candidates that fit perfectly and weren't overly expensive. What a great experience, to be guided in my quest for nice clothes by an actual clothier. This guy listened to what I wanted, then delivered impeccable choices that were high quality yet affordable. Yes I ended up spending a c-note more than I had planned but I am very happy with my purchases.

In the words of Raymond Babbitt K-Mart Sucks.. and so does K+G Mens Mart.

March Snow

2008-03-08T16:43:00.004-05:00

Presenting a post on a subject near and dear to my heart. The weather! This photo was taken at 11:30 AM on March 8th, 2008. There was nearly 9 inches on the ground in an area where the wind did not disturb the snow too much. It has been snowing all day and I expect there is another 2-3 inches out there now. I will have to make another measurement tomorrow before we dig out, to get a storm total. It is just my luck that we get this on a weekend, so that by Monday the roads will be clear and I will have no excuse to go back to bed. In any case, it has been fun to be snowed in here all day. I have been busy too, I have watched TV. napped, eaten, napped, and watched TV. It has proven to be an inexpensive weekend too, since I had originally planned to buy some books at B+N, and get an oil change. Driving about on the roads is strongly discouraged today, so there was no shopping for me.

I love disruptive weather, even though I am weary of winter and want to break out the grill, it is fascinating to see big weather develop and the consequences on everyday life. I predicted back in February that we would not get a significant snow storm for the rest of the year. I suppose I am done predicting, I blew this one badly.

Redeaux

2008-03-07T23:38:00.003-05:00

We got out early from work today, March 7th, because of a wicked winter storm. It felt like back in school, when it snowed and they let everyone go home early. Yay!
Well, folks...It is 12:40 Am on Saturday, and I didn't get a post up for Friday. I guess I just gave up my NaBloPoMo. The rules are clear. Maybe I can appeal. It would be a shame, but I will continue to complete my 30 in 30 quest regardless.

Yet another blog post about weather.

2008-03-06T20:55:00.002-05:00

I exit from my den, bleary eyed and weak.
Atrophied from a winter, cold and bleak.
Nearly crazed, whithered and pale.
I seek the sunshine, yellow, warm and hale.
I am looking for green, signs of life and light.
Alas the forecast is for a lot more white.
I go work my daily job, from shelter to shelter I flit.
Exposed just a little to the weather, then in to sit.
Back out for a time, to my waiting car again.
And trek back home, through the wind and rain.
Slip and slide the road disappears.
Don't use the brakes, use lower gears!
The days till spring are numbered, down they run.
I can't wait till the land is warmed by the sun.
To see leaves of green and shoots of grass.
The day will come when I can fish for Bass!
Till that time I can only wait.
The bears have it right, next winter lets all hibernate.

I spoke too soon

2008-03-05T21:37:00.004-05:00

In last nights blog post I rather boldly stated that it was unlikely we would experience a large snow storm this late in the season. I am a bit of a weather hound, and I like to watch the long range forecasts, look at the models etc. I have been watching a storm brewing out over Texas for several days now and couldn't help but notice the storm was tracking more to the east this time. You see, when these big, wet storms come up from the south, they can bring either rain or snow or both. It all depends on which side of the low we end up on. If this system goes east just a little, then were I am will be on the cold side, meaning snow and ice.
The models are not in agreement, and the NWS is not making a big deal out of it yet, we shall see what happens but one local forecaster is already saying this could be the big snow maker of the winter.
I brushed almost 2 inches of snow off of my car this morning, I opened the door and put in the key and immediately the wipers came on (because it was only raining yesterday) and instantly dumped several gallons of snow into my car and all over my legs and into my shoes.
Like I said previously, I am tired of it all and just want warm dry weather for a change. Perhaps this storm will go west, or further south giving us only annoyance snow, but right now it looks like it could be a whopper. Please lord, if it is going to snow let there be so much of it I can get a long weekend out of it, please.
If there is one thing I have learned in over 30 years of living in Southern Ohio, is predicting the weather more than a few hours before it happens is an exercise in futility.

Enough Aready

2008-03-04T20:15:00.003-05:00

I have been in a bit of a funque lately, and since I possess a nimble ability to self diagnose my depressions, I have been doing some thinking. I think it is the weather, it has been a very wet, cold, and gray winter here. Just yesterday we had partly cloudy skies and 68 degrees. It felt like spring and for the first time all week I was actually smiling on my way to work. The commute was almost fun on the dry, clean roads with moderate traffic. By quitting time however, it was raining heavily and traffic was hopelessly snarled. A quick glance at the long range forecast is not very encouraging either. We are expecting a chance of snow each day through Sunday and very cold overnight temps. Oh and more clouds.
Winters back is nearly broken though, this late in the season it is rare to see any large, accumulating snow storms. Historically, we need to be on the lookout for an ice storm, but mostly winter is in it's death throes by mid March. It appears that winter is clinging on this year.
I do not think I can stand another slog to work in the cold dark muck.
It is no wonder people move to warmer climates when they get older, when they have money and time on their hands. We may tease the senior citizens for fleeing the cold but more and more I can see their point.

I need this winter season to be done. I need sunshine and warm air, I need longer hours of daylight. It will come, just as sure as all the years before, but my cold and wet tolerance threshold is very, very low.

In about three months you can read how I hate the midwestern heat and humidity.

Tools for my Muse

2008-03-03T20:03:00.005-05:00

I am not much of a musician, and I am only a mediocre designer, I would never call myself and artist and lately I am finding that fact hard to reconcile. When I was younger, that is all I wanted to do, was to paint and write and draw. I did well in high school art class, I won some ribbons and even a best of show one year. I competed in the county fair and placed 3ed with an honorable mention. I was even accepted to a very prestigious art college in San Francisco when I was 17. Alas, the fancy art school was way to expensive to attend and I did not have the motivation to make it happen. Since then I have had the odd artistic renaissance every 10 years or so. I will dust off the brushes and the paints, knock the rust off of my decaying skills and try to do a serious work of art. It has been over a decade this time since I did a piece of art work I was truly proud of.

I do most of my work on the computer now, and I find that I am the jack of all trades and the master of none. I am a web designer, meaning I can manipulate pixels and make a cool logo or design. I have a knack for getting dramatic colors, but I also realize I am not as skilled as I could be. I know HTML and some programming languages, I can manage a project and I know how to deal with customers. All of this has served me well enough being self employed but it leaves me wanting more.

I have been told that it is a rare person that can design, write content, program, and construct the HTML on a web site while also leading the project, managing the help and dealing with the customer. Yet I take little pride in this skill set, I would rather be very, very good at one thing. I suppose now that I am 41 I long to be an expert at something. Every day I learn something else about my graphic program or I figure out another line of code. At this rate I will be 60 before I am truly excellent at either.

I bought a nifty tool not long ago, I have already used it several times to solve a graphics problem I was having. It is a Wacom Bamboo Pen Tablet. An input device that allows me much more control than a mouse does. This thing is very powerful and instantly all of the possibilities jumped into my head. Of course it takes time and practice to master, and it works great with a piece of software I do not understand very well (yet). I am hoping that this new tool will inspire me to learn what I have to and practice more.

Then there is the creativity issue, I do not feel very creative any more. I am not sure how to get it back, perhaps to immerse myself in art and view others creativity and hope some rubs off on me. I once read a book titled "My Name Is Asher Lev" and while I do not remember all of the plot, at least part of it dealt with art vs. illustration. A work of art should communicate something to the viewer (or reader or listener etc.). An artist has the ability to feel something and make that feeling come through in his art. I realized I was just an illustrator mostly. I could draw the lines, but I seldom came up with emotion. What I do on the computer has all been done before, and I copy a technique or method that someone else created.

I like to play my guitar, I do not claim to be very good at it, but I love to sit and strum. One of my favorite things is to drink beer with a group of friends and try to jam on some old classics. Once again though, I am only playing the chords someone else put together. In any case, I just put a Martin D18 in "Lay Away" at my favorite music store. Someday soon I will have an amazing instrument with which to play my sad 12 chords and scattered finger picking. It is fortunate that I enjoy collecting guitars as much as I do playing them. Daisy says when I bring this one home I have to sacrifice an older one. This I will do, gladly, to have the D18 but it would have made way more sense to learn to play the old beater I have first then get the awesome git fiddle.

My toys and my tools, my muse should be pretty occupied for a long time to come. If only she would wake up and give me a new vision to execute, instead of always being what has gone before.

Hurting for no reason

2008-03-02T19:30:00.004-05:00

I awoke this morning with a terrible back ache. I haven't fallen, have not done any heavy lifting, in fact I have barely exercised at all this weekend. I must have been doing strenuous labor in my sleep. The pain has made me grumpy and today has not been the best of days. It was a taste of spring outside, sunny and 51 degrees, and I did not venture out of the house.

I hope a good nights sleep fixes this unusual back pain, but then again it would seem that is exactly what made it hurt in the first place.

The Cat Hasn't Moved

2008-03-01T23:44:00.006-05:00

My cat hasn't moved all day. Good old Brinkley the kitty has found a nice spot directly on top of my daughters sweater that is laying on the bed, to sleep the entire day. This is not unusual behavior for a cat, I know cats sleep 80% of their lives. It must be nice, to go eat when you want any time of day or night, to have an unlimited supply of fresh water, then to get rubbed by your humans and sleep. Today the cat has just laid around from dawn till late evening. He sometimes gets excited at night, being a nocturnal creature by nature and all, but the setting sun has had no effect on him this day. No, he is just as lazy now as he was early this morning. Sleeping or laying on the same spot for hours on end. The three toed sloth doesn't move much either, here is some data regarding one of the laziest animals on earth (besides the man you know who behaves similarly on Sundays.) :

..Sloths are among the most somnolent animals, sleeping from 15 to 18 hours each day. They are particularly partial to nesting in the crowns of palm trees where they can camouflage as coconuts. They come to the ground to urinate and defecate only about once a week...

I assure you, Brinkley defecates more often than a Sloth but really doesn't move much more. Oh sure, occasionally he gets in the mood to play, but being a dotted upon house cat, he sleeps at least as much as the typical Sloth. Every once in a while, I have one of those weekend days when I get out of bed in the morning then go take a nap, or get up and camp on the sofa for a snooze. I imagine this is what a Sloth does for a living. The cat recently got up from his chosen spot for the day (on a piece of clothing) and promptly laid down on the floor. Oh the exhaustion he must be feeling!

If I were of a mind to believe in re-incarnation I would likely be a house cat. There cannot be a better life out there for any of God's creatures. I mean what could be better than a regimen of eating, sleeping, getting affection, sleeping some more then eating?

A cats life must be hours upon hours of blissful sleep punctuated by moments of delicious food and love from the humans. Oh what a hard life.

As a human male living with a partner of the opposite sex, I am certainly not entitled to the same privileges as the cat, if I slept all day and did nothing all the time, every day, I would not be welcome here anymore. The cat gets a pass because he doesn't have opposable thumbs. The cat has no expectation placed upon him. The cat will never be a beast of burden, nor be expected to do the laundry.

The cat truly has it made.

This is just over half way to my goal of posting 30 times in 30 days.

The Best I Can Manage Tonight

2008-02-29T23:43:00.004-05:00

The reason why I am so late and this blog is so short.
Daisy's Blogger Redesign!

Chili con Carne con Frijoles

2008-02-28T22:14:00.003-05:00

I am running late again, and it is nearly bedtime. I am late because I had to make chili for a chili cook off at work tomorrow. I am a pretty good cook, but my skills have dropped off some in the past few years. I was once known for making a great bowl of chili. I carefully selected fresh vegetables, used ground chuck as well as ground sirloin, and basically took a great deal of care while hand crafting my Texas inspired chili. I hope it is good enough to win tomorrow, but I have my doubts.

When I make chili you can feel it when you eat it, I do not make wimpy chili. I fear that the mid-western taste buds judging tomorrows eats will think my chili is too hot. I did not compromise my chili ideals for this one though. If the flavors marry the way I think they will in the refrigerator overnight, then I will have created something just short of a chili masterpiece. If great chili is not rewarded due to bland tastes in food, then so be it. The state of Texas and I know a real bowl of chili when we taste it and I have put together just such a chili. Tastes like heaven, burns like hell, the way it should be.

This is day 14 of my daily slog to post 30 times in 30 days.

D. None of the Above

2008-02-27T22:10:00.003-05:00

"..if you choose not to decide you still have made a choice.." ~ Rush (the band not the commentator)

More Thoughts on The Car

2008-02-26T21:13:00.005-05:00

My first full day with the new (used) Cadillac was quite nice. The car truly made my long commute more bearable if not an outright pleasure. The car holds the road very well, and does not get blown about by wind and passing trucks like the old Saturn. It rained and snowed here all day and the Caddie never once lost traction or threatened to slide into oncoming traffic during rush hour. It looks as though the mileage will be good too. I was told it got 28mph, if that is the case then it will only be slightly worse than my old (and much smaller) car.

Some of my observations include:
The car has so many bells and whistles that it is hard to keep the bright shiny things from getting my attention instead of the traffic. Must remember to keep eyes on the road.

This car is plumb, or cherry or whichever fruit you prefer. It may be old but it is in excellent condition. I cannot find one thing that is broken.

I realized today that I was not the target demographic for this car. Think about all the folks you know that drive Cadillac's and you will notice that many of them are retired, or in their 60's. One can see this when studying the controls for this car. The dash board is laid out with giant buttons for even the most mundane things. The analog dials are large and well lit, most of the functions are well marked and very simple. I have been over complicating this car, each time I figure out how something works (like turning on the side mirror defroster) I realize I was making it too hard. (it turns out, the mirror defroster starts when you turn on the rear window defroster).

At first I didn't think much of the heated seats, but after this mornings frosty commute I wonder what I ever did without them. No more driving for 20 minutes before the car is warm enough to be comfortable. I also like the radio controls on the steering wheel, but I keep accidentally hitting one of the buttons and am startled when my CD starts blaring when I thought I was listening to the news on, you guessed it, NPR. I have yet to figure out how to lock the radio controls in order to prevent accidental activation, but I am sure there is a huge button somewhere that will do it.

I think that all chairs should be heated, a heated office chair would be nice. What about a heated bar stool at the local saloon? Now that would be luxury. I understand that there have been some advances made in luxury automobile technology in the past few years. My daughter tells me that her friends car has both heated and cooled seating arrangements.

So now I ride to work in the lap of luxury, I have never had a nice car, always some vehicle that I settled for. The Saturn didn't even have electric windows and locks! Yesterday I even bent to roll up my window before I realized there was a tasteful (but a little big) button that does that for me. I can get used to this sort of ride, and I am only 41.

This is day 12 of my mission to blog 30 x in 30 days.

Daddy got a Caddy

2008-02-25T19:37:00.002-05:00

Today, with some help from my wonderful girlfriend, I got a used car. It is almost 10 years old, quite affordable and far from being terribly glamorous. But wait, it is a Cadillac, was taken very good care of, and is a pretty dark red color. This thing is pretty fast, quite luxurious, and solid as a rock. I am pretty happy with my new used car. From 1997 till 2001 GM made a car in Germany based on the Opal sedan and put the Cadillac nameplate on it. I am now driving a Cadillac Caterra from 1999.

I am counting on this car to ease my commute fatigue. I spend a lot of time behind the wheel, and the Saturn was starting to wear on my senses. The Saturn was loud on the road, lots of wind and road noise. The caddy is smooth and quiet. The Saturn wasn't very comfortable, the caddy is like driving around in my living room recliner (in leather of course). The list goes on, and even though this car is old, I feel spoiled and pampered while driving.

The old Saturn is now being driven by my daughter, she doesn't think the Saturn is very sexy, but she will get used to it. In the meantime, Daddy has a Caddy.

This is day 11 of blogging every day for 30 days.

Teens and Automobiles

2008-02-24T20:26:00.006-05:00

My eldest daughter had been driving for about six months when (yesterday) she had her first accident. It was a bad one too, flipped the car on it's top. It must have been terrifying for her, I know it was for me when I got the phone call. She is stiff, and sore, but otherwise intact. It could have been so much worse. We are all lucky she walked away from this one.

As a father, I worry about her every moment she is out on the road, fatal accidents happen each day and things can go wrong so fast out on the highway. I preach and harp on this fact all of the time, because I need her to understand that the roads are a dangerous place. I cannot keep her from driving, nor would I want to, but there is a strong instinct to keep her safe, to keep her out of harms way. There is a temptation to just drive the girl where she needs to go, like I have all of her life until recently. Letting my daughter grow up is hard, but inevitable. I remember when I started driving, my father imposed a curfew that lasted all of two weeks or so, I broke it so often I think he gave up.

My first car was a 1970 VW bug that we pulled out of a farmers cow pasture. This story sounds cliche but it really happened. My father and I pulled the bug out of the weeds, put in a new battery, topped it up with some fresh gas and it started right up. I believe he paid $300.00 for the car. I was now the proud owner of some four wheeled freedom. I loved my VW, and while it was ugly it ran well and had some character. I wrecked it shortly after I got it, I was on my way to school with some friends and one of them had moved my rear view mirror to fix his hair (it was the 80's and he had pretty hair). So I started adjusting the mirror back to a position where I could use it and neglected to keep both eyes on the road. In a split second I had ploughed into a parked car from behind. The parked car wasn't damaged much but my beetle was done.

I was 16 and back to riding the school bus for awhile, this lasted about a month or so when my Grandparents offered to help purchase another car. We searched about our small community for a week or so when dad found a 1972 AMC Gremlin. The car was pretty ugly, it was a Gremlin after all but this one had an abundance of surface rust marring the exterior. Today I understand why dad wanted me to get this car. Aside from the price being right, it wasnt too fast, or too sexy and was mechanically sound. He wanted me in an unglamorous car, better to stay out of trouble that way.

The "Grim Gremlin" as we affectionately called it soon started falling apart. I locked up the brakes in my own driveway one winter afternoon on a sheet of ice and hit the telephone pole that supported our "area light", right in my own yard! I saved up my money and bought new parts at the junk yard, I pulled the dents out of the grille area, taped up what I could with duct tape and bailing wire and got back on the road. This car would never pass a safety inspection but it always started and got me where I needed to go.
Later that summer, the reverse gear went out of it, so I had to be careful where I parked. Then the shock absorbers went and it rode like a stagecoach. One afternoon my evil step brother was horsing around with a bb gun and shot out the back window. By now the car was just a rolling heap but I kept driving it.
The most famous thing about this car was the afternoon my senior year in highschool when a bunch of friends and I skipped skipped out and drove the car to a secluded area (we lived in the middle of nowhere, in the country, so there was no shortage of secluded areas). One of my friends older brother was a sign painter, so we had loaded up on cans of sign paint and rollers and brushes and painted the car. The rusted Gremlin now had a coat of multi colored paint, stripes and dots and bright colors. It was quite the way to get noticed, amazingly most of the kids in school got the joke and thought the brightly colored car was cool. Instead of having the class of '84 sign my yearbook, I had them all sign my car in blue paint. Now the car was a rolling symbol of our last year in high school.

Just before graduation I was driving home from school when one of my friends (in a new red Pontiac Fiero) ran up behind me and started acting like he wanted to race. I floored my tiny six cylinder and took off down the road ahead of the Fiero as my friend tried to pass. Suddenly the hood of my car (held to the hinges with bailing wire) flew up and hung by one thin wire to the corner of the engine compartment. I slowed and pulled over. Here was the hood of the car hanging in the air like a sail. Not knowing what to do, I pushed the hood over till the binding snapped and let it roll off into the ditch on the side of the road, with the intent of getting it later.

The next day I borrowed my dads pick up truck and went to get my hood. The part was nowhere to be found. My friends and I looked high and low for the hood, even asked the local farmers if they had seen it, but no one had. We joked for years afterward that one of the hillbilly families in the area had grabbed it and made a psychedelic coffee table out of it.

I turned 18 and only days afterward I decided to leave home, to go live in San Diego with some old friends, to make my way away from the family. I traded the Gremlin for a piece of ham radio equipment and that was the end of an era. I got on a plane and never saw that car again. I am asked about it still, if I am haunting my old home town. There is a surviving photo of it around here somewhere, I hope I can find it as that photo is the last proof this auto ever existed.

I can't imagine what my father thought about this auto adventure. I am sure he lost sleep wondering if I was getting trouble, if I was driving safe, if I was coming home at night. I never once got cited in this car, drank beer on back roads and never got caught, remarkable when you think about it. This car screamed to law enforcement that we were probably partying our butts off, I may as well have had a sign painted on it that said "We are HIGH pull us over" but I got very little harassment from the law.

My daughter simply lost control of her car, no booze or drugs involved, she was alone so there was no rough housing with her friends. I hope it serves as a lesson that keeping ones eyes on the road is vitally important. I am giving her my car tomorrow, as I am buying another, I can only hope she has better sense than I, and maintains the cars current color.

This is day 10 of trying to blog 30 times in 30 days.

I Am Running Late

2008-02-23T23:43:00.004-05:00

Ok, so I decided to participate in a "blog 30 days in a row" challenge. It is Saturday night, I am buzzing like a mother and it has been a stressful day (future blog post I am sure). Therefore I am cutting this one short. It is after all a blog post so I still qualify for the 30 in 30. I hope you are having as good a Saturday night as I.

This is day 8 or 9 of my trek to the hallowed halls of 30 blogs in 30 days honorees.

You Are What You Eat

2008-02-22T22:57:00.006-05:00

If we are what we eat, then I am a cross between a slab of bacon and a block of cheese, nothing green in sight. That is until about a week ago when I decided to join Daisy in an effort to diet. So now I am committed to diet to the point of emaciation, a 50 lbs. goal! I will be so sveldt and sexy Daisy won't know what to do with me (although I bet she figures something out).
So goodbye Cheezit ®'s and hello diet food. Here I have reviewed some of the weird as well as familiar foods that have become a part of my daily nourishment.

Breakfast: Granola
The 90 calorie whole grain granola bar, made by that freaky Quaker dude, that stands around in school playgrounds ostensibly handing out healthy snacks for the children with his stony, plastic expression. This granola bar is 2 points in the Weight Watchers pantheon of numbered foods. It is about the size of a large eraser, in fact I always eat two. One gets stuck in my teeth and I derive no immediate nourishment from it, only later as I finally get it all out of my molars do I really feel I have eaten it.
I have two of these each morning for Breakfast. Note that I wake up ravenous each day. It is the hungriest time for me. Lord knows there is nothing like sleeping to work up a healthy appetite.
They taste good and provide a boost of carbo energy, after I get the first one out of my teeth and into my belly that is. I like them. Rating: 8

Breakfast: Banana
In addition to my granola snack, I eat a banana each morning, since I eat on the run, the back of my car smells like the primate enclosure at the zoo because of the peels I have yet to remove to the bin. You really can't go wrong with a banana. It may well be The Worlds Most Perfect Food. Better by far than the Incredible Edible Egg, and less fat than the Other White Meat (no Carp isn't the other white meat) sadly, it is seldom Whats For Dinner.

How can I fault the banana for anything other than the inconvenient waste when the fruity meat is gone and I have a peel to dispose of? Since it is bio-degradable and all, I have often thought about chucking it out the window, but I am always afraid the commuter in back of me will lose traction when they run over it causing an embarrassing incident on the highway.
Bananas are way good and so good for you. Rating: 10

Anytime: Rice Cake
With a point value of one (1) this unnatural snack food should be a boon for satiating any and all munchie attacks that may occur. As it turns out I do not like them very well. I bought the white cheddar cheese flavored disks. Believe me they are no substitute for real white cheddar, nor cheddar popcorn, or white cheddar cheezit's or anything for that matter. The flavor isn't bad but eating one of these is a bit like consuming Styrofoam. I may as well put some cheese flavoring on a bag of packing peanuts (theres the UPS store, lets pull over and get some grub!). They are messy too, leaving crumbs all over my shirt, no matter how carefully I put them in my mouth. I tried to eat one in the lunch room at work last week. I had to back away from the table and lean forward a little so as I ate the crumbs would harmlessly hit the floor instead of my shirt. I can only imagine what I looked like. I have since declined to eat them at work. Very much like a foamy air filled hockey puck. Rating 2.

Lunch: Yogurt
Here is a lunch I can support, I usually eat a healthy sandwich or a frozen reduced calorie and fat frozen entree, then enjoy this creamy goodness for desert. I am not sure how they make skim milk culture with Aspertame in it taste so good but thank god they do. I am sure I would just as soon be fat if I couldn't have yogurt.

Oddly enough, I seldom eat the stuff when I am not on a diet, I mean why eat yogurt when it is ok to have ice cream or boston cream pie. As an added bonus I do not have to pick it out of my teeth later.

This diet staple is a winner. Rating 10

Dinner: Turkey
You knew this one was coming. The savior of dieting beef eaters everywhere. You have heard the line in recipes, "for a low-fat alternative to beef, replace with lean ground turkey". That theory only works partially. Tonight I had turkey sloppy joe's. They were quite good and will probably become a family favorite. This is only because with tomato sauce and seasoning you cant really tell what kind of meat it is. It could be rats assholes (2 points) and still taste good smothered in sloppy joe goodness.

We do several things with this versatile and healthy meat. Everything but eat it plain, that would be truly tastless. What happens to turkey when it is ground? It does not remind me of Thankgiving at all. It is also nearly as expensive as beef with many designer brands catering to the diet / healthy eating crowd. Put a green label on it and some clever packaging and suddenly it is trendy and healthy and a $1.00 more than it should be.
Overall a good diet food. Rating: 7

Dinner: Salad
My dream salad: iceberg lettuce, mushrooms, onions, croutons, cheese, more cheese, bacon, ham, bean sprouts, more bacon, chopped eggs, all unrecognizable due to the thick layer of full fat ranch dressing pumped over the top. The reality is we eat alot of salad these days, and not dream salads either. As it turns out there are a gazillion different kinds of lettuce and they are quite good. Who knew? Years ago there was one type of salad and it only had the ubiquitous iceberg. I love the color and texture of having many types of leaves in my salad. Gone is the cup o ranch, replaced by a spray bottle of dressing. The good news is 20 sprays of Cesar flavored dressing like product is 0 points. Pretty good stuff though and it lets the flavor of the weed tops come through.

Decent diet food. Rating: 8

Condiments: Butter Stuff
I cant believe it exists, let alone it's not butter. The height of fake food technology is the butter spray and the butter powder. It is remarkable how good these products taste really, yay chemistry. However, these condiments have never seen a dairy. I have no idea what the spray on butter is made of. I only hope I look like Fabio if I eat enough of it. The powder is really good on potato's. Not as good as real butter, but then again few things are as tasty as butter. It will suffice to make the mostly bland foods that are on the diet list palatable and someday when I am in "maintenance" I can eat butter again.

I might be able to snort the powder, and get a butter flavored high. Just roll up a $100.00 bill and pretend it is 1979 and get down with butter flake. (the bee-gees optional)

The spray packaging reminds me of cleaning solution or hair spray, tastes fine, but I am having some trouble with the concept of spray on food. The package says in proud letters that it is the original. Yes, whoever invented the spray on, oil like, butter flavored goo was definitely an original. Who thinks of this stuff?

Very weird but tasty. Rating: 7

So that is my rundown of diet foods for tonight. I am not hungry, I have eaten well, and with a little luck I am losing pounds even as I write. Soon I will be spray painted leafy green milk curd with turkey feathers and whole oats. We are what we eat.

This is day 8 of my pilgrimage to blogging nirvana.

Snow Day

2008-02-21T21:54:00.003-05:00

Praying for a level 3 Snow Emergency
Parts of Ohio are about to get slammed with winter weather. It is looking like my part of Ohio will only be touched by winter weather. All season, I have seen storms come up and dump snow and ice to the west of where I am but only graze my county. This has meant long commutes on slippery roads that were slow but passable, and sure enough I made it to work (albeit late).
Our company has a policy about snow days, if the local authorities declare a "level 3" (meaning the sheriffs department doesn't want you on the road) then we are exempt from work and do not have to drag our frozen body's out to the frozen car and slog to the office.

The radar echo's are not looking so good (if one wants a snowy mess) most of the precipitation is south and west of here (again). One can hope though, that by some fluke of nature a ton of snow has fallen over night and I can just go back to bed in the morning.

Even grown ups want a snow day once in awhile.

This is day 7 of my ambitious plan to blog 30 times in 30 days.

Blather, Banality, and Pablum V.1.0

2008-02-20T21:00:00.007-05:00

I am late to be blogging about the campaign. I realize there are hundreds if not tens of thousands of blog posts already out there that have said much the same things I am writing here tonight, but these are my words and it is my blog, so that makes it original. I needed some time to get fed up with the whole lot of them. My friends at NPR have to take some of the credit for that, they fill the airwaves with endless prattle about the Primaries, all day, every day. Here are my thoughts about the candidates.

Hillary Clinton
I can hardly stand to listen to this woman speak. She reminds me of a stereotypical nagging wife or mother when she speaks. This may be because she is likely both. I can overlook how she sounds in the radio speakers or on T.V. if her message makes sense, and it doesn't.

I have a long standing negative bias against Hillary, because of her history in the White House with Bill. I didn't share the joy for the eight years she and her husband were in office. I worked hard, had good times and bad, and lived my life. I did not get rich, I didn't suddenly get subsidized health care, I didn't buy an SUV with all the abundance that the Clinton's supposedly brought our nation. I just hung in there and lived, much the same way I did when George the 41 was in office. It just doesn't matter that much. I never thought a couple from Arkansas were terribly qualified to be the President and First lady, I mean have you ever been to Arkansas? I remember thinking she was a parody, trying to legislate by her husbands side. It was novel for awhile but became very annoying. I don't know anyone who voted for Hillary. Now is our chance apparently.

I could go on about her husbands bad traits but he is not running again (ostensibly anyway), no, this is about Hillary Clinton, and there is no way I could support her. Besides being way too liberal for my tastes she seldom has a good idea in her head, at least based on what I hear her say. What I hear her say is whatever the voters want to hear. Today she was in Ohio, speaking to a group of Union workers. The sound byte went something like this "This election isn't about words alone, but work, lots of hard work to get America working!" (sic) This brought the obligatory waves of adulation and cheers from the assembled group. I just rolled my eyes, how can you fight platitudes with another platitude. I would also like to point out that unemployed auto workers in Youngstown notwithstanding, America stands at around 5% unemployment. Every freshman economics student knows that is easily considered full employment. She also went on to say she had a plan to help our sub prime mortgage foreclosure stricken state. Hillary wishes to put a moratorium on foreclosures for 90 days. Well that is fine Hillary, how exactly do you plan on forcing a private institution to not reclaim it's property. I am sorry for the families that got into trouble with mortgages way over their head, but I fail to see how the government can interfere like that. I doubt it is legal to step in and say.. "bank you cant get your money back on a bad loan because Hillary passed a law that says you cant". The only government solution I can think of is a huge subsidy so the bank doesn't go out of business waiting to get it's money back. I almost hope she is the nominee, just to see how far out in left field the Democratic party can get.

John McCain
I have a conservative attitude regarding many issues, not all of them as you know from previous blogs, but typically a conservative makes more sense to me. I do not like John McCain much, it would seem he is the only choice left for the other side of the aisle. Old John doesn't know what he is, he has frequently said whatever needed saying at the time to garner favor, even throwing his supposed conservative values under the buss in an effort to seem more moderate and appeal to the vaunted "swing voter" or Independent. Maybe John was trying to seem more palatable to liberals, so they would save some mud for each other and not sling it all at him. Then there is the way he speaks, John McCain sounds like an Episcopal minister. He sounds exactly like a dottering ederly clergyman, explaining how the love of God can save my soul. Either that or Mr. Rogers, "..I can fix the economy, can you say economy? We will win the war in Iraq. Now, are you ready to go to the land of make believe?.." Once again not a good choice.

What about a leader? What about someone who gives Americans some credit and chooses not to say any old thing that seems right at the moment. Is it really so hard to carefully think out a platform, believe in your mission, then LEAD people to think the way you do? What about giving us real choices and ideas instead of pablum and noise.

Tomorrow I will pick on Obama and Huckabee, and yes W. even though he isn't running, he finally deserves some barbs from me.

This is day 6 of my ongoing attempt to write a blog every day for 30 days.

Past My Bedtime

2008-02-19T22:12:00.002-05:00

I can remember a time when 10:00 PM was considered early for me. I was a confirmed night owl, always up till the wee hours. Now I need to be asleep by 10 or 10:30 or my morning is very painful the next day. I guess I am getting old. Since it is now past 10:00 PM, I am going to bed. A longer blog post tomorrow. I just do not feel witty or creative at the moment, I just want to sleep.

This is day 5 of my attempt to blog every day for 30 days.

Stop the madness!!

2008-02-18T19:20:00.003-05:00

Today I started a diet, even though they say it isn't a diet since diets dont work. I signed up for Weight Watchers. Daisy signed up a week ago and is still enthusiastic about it. She has lost 4.5 lbs. and feels good about it. I have been trying to make better choices since last labor day. I managed to lose 18 lbs but then my weight loss stopped dead. The sudden end to weight loss may have something to do with my "no diet saturday" policy. This theory of dieting follows that if I am good all week, and make good food choices, then on Saturday I can eat and drink what I want. Behaving this way resulted in an endless cycle. I would get on the scale on Friday morning and be happy that I had lost 3 lbs during the week, I would enjoy my weekend with the usual foods. McDonalds on Saturday morning, meat and cheese for lunch, maybe a pizza or some bar food for dinner, a shit load of vodka later on and the obligatory munchies right before bed. While I was usually better behaved on Sunday, the damage was done. On Monday morning during my visit to the scale, I would find I had gained 3 lbs back.

Obviously, this cycle could go on forever with no real gains (or losses for that matter). So I finally decided to get serious about it and lose 50 lbs. I will still be a fat guy 50 lbs from now but that is about what I can realistically expect achieve and maintain.

I shelled out $65.00 so I could use the online tools Weight Watchers provides. Now I live in a world of points. Weight Watchers has actually turned the word "points" into a registered trade mark. Now I look up the point values of my favorite foods, or how to get the most food for the least number of points etc. I will let you know how it goes.

One good thing, I get 35 weekly "bonus" points, ostensibly for cheating. This means I have Saturday night all planned out in advance.

1.5 oz. VODKA = 2 points 35 / 2 = 17 YAY!

This is day 4 of my mission to blog 30 days in a row.

It's A Place to Live

2008-02-17T23:33:00.003-05:00

This afternoon we drove to a big Best Buy store to buy a new toy, a pen tablet, so I could work on Daisies new blogger template. The store is in an up and coming neighborhood on the east side of Columbus, Ohio. This is one of those areas that is growing fast with new money, floods of families with small kids, a husband with a good job, a soccer mom with a mini van. A few years ago this town was small, quaint, and surrounded by corn fields. Today there are upscale grocery stores, nice places to eat, theaters and malls, and an explosion of new housing.
Every one of these developments is trying to convey an upscale image. You know the place, there is a nice landscaped lawn area facing the road, with a semi circular rock wall, lit appropriately of course. On the wall are some big brass letters spelling out the name of the development. Here we have "The Reserve at Cross Creek" or "The Trails at Morgan Farm", there was even a "The Residences at Turnberry". Give me a break, what these developments are really mcmansions (read: sub-prime issues) plopped down in a former soybean field and gussied up with some landscaping and the obligatory rock wall with lettering. It should be "Sub Prime Acres" or "Pretension Prairie" how about "The Residences at Cookie Cutter Acres"?
I wonder at the sorts of people that buy into this sort of pseudo luxury spin builders put on these developments. Do they get some sort of satisfaction, living in a house that is too expensive, 2 feet from the neighbor, with cul de sacs with nothing but surveyors flags to show where more mc mansions will someday go. Since it has a fancy name, that must mean it is a good neighborhood, gee lets borrow too much money and buy it.
I live in a block of homes that have no name, unless it would be "the slums on fair" or "po folks estates". My neighborhood at least has some character, and some life, and we aren't in over our heads on the mortgage.

This is day three of my quest to post every day for 30 days.

Liquor in the front, and the back, and on the sides.

2008-02-16T20:23:00.005-05:00

A long overdue post about liquor
It is time for another post about a subject dear to my heart, yes, that special solvent, that fruit of the grain, the distilled essence of good times and Saturday nights, liquor!

Sailor Jerrys Naval Strength Spiced Rum:
I like rum, especially the sweet dark rums that leave your gums feeling slightly numb and a tingling in your finger tips. For many years rum was sort of the red headed step child of liquors. There were three kinds from the company with the bat in the logo, there was a sweet dark rum from Jamaica and of course the ubiquitous Captain. Recently I have noticed an explosion of new rum brands appearing on the shelves of my favorite liquor store. There are "single barrel" rums, specialty flavored rums, very high proof rum, and rums from "estates".

I usually stick to Bacardi Select when I decide to drink rum in quantity, it is a high quality spirit, palatable straight but delightful mixed with coke or orange juice. Nothing beats the flavor of a Cuba Libre made with Bacardi Select and a fresh lime. When it comes to spiced rums, I have always went with Captain Morgan, but the problem with the Captain (besides a bombardment of clever advertising) is the fact it is only 70 proof, relegating it to the realm of girl drinks. A real man doesn't order Captain Morgan in public, despite what the commercials depict. Recently I spotted a bottle of Sailor Jerrys Spice Rum on the shelf, I bought the jumbo bottle (I mean really, a 5th is just the sample size) and took it home for a tasting.

First off I noticed the distinctive logo, a very WW2 era depiction of a hula dancer with a Ukulele in the style of a tattoo. As I settled in with my first glass, over ice, I looked up the brands website. Turns out that there was a real life Sailor Jerry. The man was a soldier and then a famous tattoo artist. He lent his reputation to this brand and it creates instant mystique. This rum is spiced rum for men. It says on the label that it is Navy Rum and 92 proof.

92 proof is pretty stout, and there is the risk of it tasting like lighter fluid. Not the case with this spirit, it is smooth, sweet and delicious. While it says it is Navy Rum, Her Majesties Navy never had it this good. Naval strength rum is a reference to the days of sail, when every man got a ration of rum mixed with water called grog. The rum had to be strong enough to survive the sea voyages and there had to be enough alcohol in it to kill the cooties found in the barrels of water consumed at sea. Frankly the rum was safer to drink than the water.

All of this combines to create a fun and memorable brand for this liquor. The taste is bold and flavorful without being noxious, and the high proof means it works sooner rather than later. The price is right too, about $25.00 for the 1.74 litre bottle. I highly recommend this rum for a night of Cuba Libres and your favorite cigar. It is also appropriate for swilling, as the price is very good.

My new bar
Over the years I have usually maintained a home bar, for my own enjoyment as well as entertaining. In the old days, my bar was as well stocked as any of the commercial bars in the small town I lived in. My friends would come over regularly as you can imagine. I kept a "tip" jar on the bar but it never paid for the consumption. It was ok with me, I enjoyed the company and when dealing with these friends it all came out in the wash somewhere down the line. I seldom paid when we went out, as compensation for all the booze I supplied at home.

I moved around some, re-established a couple of home bars, some of them were pretty spectacular. As I settle down in my new digs with Daisy, I am once again starting up a liquor cabinet, with the goal of finishing off the basement this spring with a real bar. I have done well with this one, I haven't counted the bottles, but I know I am now very well stocked.
While I still love to polish a bar stool at a local dive, it is getting more difficult to spend money at a bar. I am spoiled rotten as the fine liquors I have at home, already bought and paid for are very expensive in a public bar. I am still working on some items but I have all of my favorites, a good selection of bourbon, Irish whiskey, a stunning selection of all of my favorite vodkas. I even have a scotch and some high end specialty liquors, like Chambord and Frangellico. Daisy likes to use the Frangellico in coffee drinks.

I love to party, and entertain and drink, but I am down to one night a week now. I am too old to carry on like I used to and I have a good job to hold down. I still like to have my bar though, I find it odd that I get almost as much pleasure out of buying and having the bottles as I do drinking them. Perhaps it is the fact that I *could* drink them any time I wanted. I get a great deal of pleasure out of coming home and just looking at my amazing bar. I have big plans for my basement bar when it happens. I want neon and padded bar stools, I want a small refrigerator and a stunning back bar with shelves and mirrors. I may only have two or three parties a year down there, but what fun in any case.

Crown Royal Special Reserve:
I was in a local bar not long ago, it was happy hour and all drinks were half price. At half price it is fun to go ahead and get the special, expensive liquors that you wouldn't normally order. I asked for a shot of Crown Royal Special Reserve on the rocks. What a splendid example of blended whiskey. Think of the signature smoothness and flavor of a fine Canadian blend like Crown Royal then multiply that by 10. Special Reserve is Crown Royal in a mellow, mature and flavorful prime. I love this stuff, and as you can see from the photo, I bought my own bottle. The bottle pictured was one of my rewards for getting a near perfect evaluation at work and a hefty raise. It would be a shame to mix this one with anything, and there is no need, delicious and smooth right out of the bottle. I highly recommend this Canadian whiskey as a great libation for savoring anytime.

This is day two of my quest to blog each and everyday for 30 days. Enjoy.

Blog Fodder, indeed..

2008-02-15T22:52:00.004-05:00

Well now I went and did it, I joined a "challenge" where one blogs everyday for 30 days and then gets some minor recognition on a site www.nablopomo.com apparently the name stands for National Blog Posting Month, which used to be November, but now it is every month. So here we go, I who seldom posts to this blog, have now committed to posting every day for a month. Check it every day till March 16th.

Yesterday was Valentines day, it is a day that always creeps up on me and subtlety nags me to honor it with my someone special. I do not hate the day, I only have trouble with the concept. I love my girl each and every day of the week, I am sure to let her know I love her every day too, with words and actions. It is easy and natural and I do not need a pseudo holiday once a year to express my love for her. To her credit, she feels much the way I do, we simply exchange a few niceties and move on, fun but totally unnecessary.

I decided to get her some roses, big pretty roses. Since I have only given her flowers on a few occasions in our relationship, it is still a special thing, not tired or cliche. However, I was guilty, I had waited till the last possible moment to get any gift at all and I was on my way home from work when I stopped at the local florist. They were packed to the rafters with customer too. The building was heaving with every working man in town on their way home from work, looking lost and slightly uncomfortable in the store, frantically looking for the right bouquet.

There were blue collar types, construction workers, business men and professionals, all with the same blank stare and desperate desire to get something to honor their mate, and maybe not spend too much money, and get the hell out of there before the traffic got to heavy for the commute. I stumbled around some, as I didn't understand the system at first. I mean there were cooler doors full of flowers, some in bouquets, some stand alone, others wrapped, some in vases.

Once I figured out that I could get my flowers ala carte, I proceeded to choose a dozen red roses. I mean what could be more romantic than red roses? Well.. two dozen red roses thats what! A dozen roses is fine for making up after you stayed out too late and came home stinking of booze and cigarettes, then spending Sunday sick, tired and farting all over the house. No, a dozen roses wont do it when the point is to honor your lover.

Two dozen roses however, now that is an entirely different story. Sheer quantity and cost covers the fact that you only thought to buy something on your way home from work on the special night. It says, I really, really, really, love you baby. In all seriousness, two dozen roses even impresses me. They are flat out gorgeous and displayed proudly in the living room on the mantle. Funny how 12 more of something is suddenly not cliche or standard, but special.

The fact is, when she looks at those roses, for a fleeting time, as they will eventually die and fade, I hope she sees 24 reminders that I do love her, even though I am crippled by being a man, and not terribly sentimental.

I dont have a very good history with Valentines day, I left my cheating wife on Valentines day, after a big fight I said good-bye on Feb. 14th 2000. I never looked back. Since then I have broken up with two women with whom I was in a relationship, either on the 14th or within a day or two. I didnt mean to do it on that day, it was pure coincidence, really. I think February is partially to blame, the limbo between winter and spring, the gray days and cold nights, the colorless slog to the end of winter.

So I do not feel so bad on one level, there were hundreds of other men doing the same thing I was doing at the florist yesterday. "Oh I better get something for the woman on the way home", we all were in the same sad situation, but I would bet to a man, our hearts were in the right place. Maybe we hadn't thought out and planned an elaborate celebration but we did think to do something special after all and I bet all of us men on our commute home thought about what a great woman we were fortunate enough to have. I know I was, thinking that a couple dozen roses were only one small expression of a much deeper feeling, the love, the friendship, the intimacy.

Is it Memorial Day yet?

Blog post number one (1)

My Amazing Life

2008-01-28T00:54:00.000-05:00

Well, I certainly haven't blogged much lately. I actually have a running list of subjects to blog about and think about incidents in my daily life in terms of blog titles. Here are some examples; "Talking heads in space" while thinking of a response to current politics, or "commuting with idiots" when considering my long morning commute. Tonight I am going to write a watershed blog post, one that sort of catches up the long months with no word on this site.

By now everyone knows I have a "real" job, after nearly 10 years of being self employed, I am finally working for the "Man" again. I like it, I have the best job in the world, it pays very well, it is fun, I am constantly challenged and my boss rewards me for my efforts. Nearly every day I thank my higher power for the luck and circumstance that brought me to this place.

Getting a regular paycheck is nice, it allows one to plan for the future and provides structure. In the not so distant past, I never knew from one month to the next how I would pay the bills. Really, the month would start and I would only have the vaguest notion as to how I might get rent paid or the car payment met. I have lost utilities and gone without adequate groceries (please note I nearly always had a bottle of vodka in the freezer, there are more important things than food). Those days are over now, (now I have a huge, fully stocked bar!) I do not really worry about anything basic, more about how I might save some money. The problem I am dealing with recently is trying to save some cash, because I know I could lose this all tomorrow. I have lost it all before, so personal experience has proven that all things are fleeting.

I am living with my dream girl too, lately we have been like a married couple, there is lacking some of the powerful spark that characterized our relationship in the beginning. This is all completely normal, but tonight while I write this piece, I wish to proclaim publicly that for now and forever she is my soul mate, my best friend and the best damn thing that has ever happened to me.

Daisy got a haircut this weekend, she had a photo of Meg Ryan and took it to the stylist to re-create the hair in the photo on her own head. What a dramatic change a simple haircut can bring about, she is absolutely gorgeous in her new hair. I have always thought my girl was beautiful, but this simple change truly makes her even more beautiful to me. But I digress, I wanted to show how her love for me had totally changed my life. If I step back and look at her with the eyes that first saw her, the eyes that told me she was the one when I first saw her as she pulled up to the curb on our first date, the eyes that saw the woman I would be in love with from first sight. I can see even more of her now, way beyond the cute haircut and the pretty smile.

Without her, I would likely have continued as a self employed hack. Yes, I know, I worked hard and I did something most folks only dream about, I paid the bills by working for myself, I had the American dream of entrepreneurship for nearly a decade. In reality, I was socially stunted, I was abysmally lonesome and I drank too much (now I drink too much because it is fun, not for want of company). I would have kept going to bars, looking for one night of love, I would have maintained the status quo, and any attempt at solving my problems would have taken a very long and convoluted path to resolution.

Daisy changed all of that, she gave me a reason to break out and do well. I wanted to get a steady job so I could offer her more than the volatile nature of being a freelance web designer. I settled into a stable life with her, a happy life. I live in her house, but I pay my way, and it feels more like OUR house everyday. We never fight, we seldom get annoyed with each other, we often laugh and smile together, we often find yet another thing that we have in common, as well as discover differences. I do not like Brussels sprouts, to me they taste like burnt, bitter cabbage, but she loves them, steamed in butter. If we go our entire lives and only find things like differences in our taste of Brussels Spouts, I say we have every chance of being united forever.

So I owe my new amazing life to her, a new town to live in, a new job to go to, endless evenings with someone I cant wait to see each day, a bed with a beautiful woman who loves me each night. I really cannot ask for much more. I am truly content and only hope I give back to her what she gives to me each day. I am unworthy.

Looking back all I can say is, finally, I am enjoying a life of contentment, a life full of love, a life that has excitement for the future and enough freedom to not stifle, an amazing life.

My Morning With NPR

2007-12-22T07:50:00.000-05:00

Ok, so I yearn for intelligent talk radio in crystal clear FM reception for my long morning commute. I stumbled upon Columbus' public radio station not too long ago. The programming features the usual nationally syndicated shows that are the staple of public radio everywhere. Shows like "All Things Considered" aka (All things distorted), Market Place, Morning Edition etc. I know the names, as they haven't changed much since I last listened to public radio regularly, Cokie Roberts, Karl Castle, Bob Edwards, the heavy hitters of NPR and PRI radio. These journalist reporters have been around a long time. The packaging is the same too, human interest stories with sound effects, think a story on some homeless dude in San Francisco. Before the actual story begins you hear in the background a bus moving away from the bus stop, maybe a siren from an emergency vehicle, then you might hear the subject of our story hit a crack pipe or chug a pint...or then there might be the sound of birds drowned out by a tractor before a story on some family in Africa that doesn't have the good sense to move where the food is and instead fight a war over the few grains that are left to pound into grit for dinner.
I actually enjoy listening to straight news with an in depth angle, I have learned much from NPR and they often produce high quality bits that are better by far than the local AM news, weather and sports station. The drivel is the same though, today as I listened,I found myself yelling at the smooth disembodied voice of the reporter droning out of my speakers. The first time I yelled, I didn't think too much much of it but by the time I had been on the road for an hour, I realized I was having a full on discussion with my radio. I had been screaming at nearly every story I heard.
It does not seem to be one story with a liberal bent that gets my goat, I am an independent after all and try to be open minded. it is the relentless pounding they give the listener, with stories as varied as manufacturing in China all the way to puppies born to a rare breed of Dachshund in Missouri, it just does not matter the subject matter, there is a "green" angle to it, and a "conservatives suck" tinge. Somehow the stories are all delivered to make one believe that somehow, giving my rare Dachshund recycled paper chips to lay on at night will save the world from itself. Or that because I am a fat, rich American and buy stuff from China that I am contributing to the mass extinction that is imminent from greenhouse gas.
This morning I learned that the U.S. EPA denied a request by the California legislature to impose restrictions on carbon emissions that are much more strict than the national law requires. The EPA was right to say no, and I found myself shouting "Good" when some whiney milqetoast was crying about how California was ready to make a stand and make a difference in the world with their uber green carbon emission laws. Fuck him, and fuck California, maybe the rest of the nation should just give the west coast enough rope to hang themselves after all. Go ahead and pass your ridiculous law but don't come crying to me when your economy fails for all the illegal folks working on your farms and all the industry has left because they cant afford to comply with your carbon restrictions.
The straw that broke the camels back (no offense to PITA or anyone who loves camels) was a story on the 2008 presidential candidates. A woman in Iowa was praising John Edwards for "taking a stand against large corporations". She didn't mention anything specific, just that being against big business was a good thing. She was dead serious and stated she would support Edwards for his firm and committed stand against big business. That was it, I yelled a string of choice oaths at the radio and switched the station back to the static and pablum of the local news, weather and sports, station. Those large corporations pay my salary, all that "big business" is what keeps the economy in general afloat. I like my salary, and I enjoy having a job and if John Edwards wants to damage my gravy train then fuck him and the horse he rode in on. (oops sorry if that offended any horse lovers).
I am done with public radio for awhile, I feel bad for the types of folks that listen to this stuff everyday and do not have any other reference to reality. To them what they hear each day is reality and that is too bad. The person who buys this type of journalism in total, is a person who is hopeless, feels bad about being an American, wants our nation to grovel and feel guilty about being powerful and rich. This person thinks they can make a difference in their dying world by buying a Prius. This person is sad, and guilty and pathetic.
My world is not dying, I choose to work hard, burn gas, eat fat, buy stuff and be happy about it.
There is nothing wrong with social responsibility, there is nothing wrong with trying to conserve the environment, there just has to be some sort of balance and I am not sure I have to feel like the bad guy.
It is four days till Christmas, I am off to be a consumer and I wont feel guilty about it at all.

Double Dipping - Science Made Me Bland

2007-08-17T21:20:00.000-04:00

Yes it is a double blogging feature. Twice the entertainment for the price of one! I figure since I havent blogged in almost two months it is only right I try to get right with my blogging regimen. I was actually starting to develop a following when I fell off the face of the blogging earth. Folks would undoubtedly come to my blog, anxiously awaiting the next chapter in my rambling saga only to notice I hadnt written a thing. The next time they came and noticed there was nothing new, maybe they read the archives or re-read a favorite from months gone by. Then, eventually they stopped coming, assuming (correctly I might add) that I had once again been too lazy or too busy or just otherwise occupied to write in my blog. Well I am back for now, tonight anyway so enjoy.

Not long ago I wrote about smoking in Ohio, we have that infernal smoking ban. You know the one where the government tells me I cant participate in a legal activity in a public building. Well I made an analogy to things other people do in public that I dont like but you dont see the government legislating against it. One of those things is heavy perfume on a woman (or man but it seldom happens with men). There is that woman in the check out line at the store, on her cell phone, trying to fish out her debit card to purchase her groceries and I can smell her perfume two aisles away. Or the woman that walks by briskly and leaves a pool of thick perfumed air so thick you can swim in it.
I recently started a new job, there is a patio outside where us smokers are relegated on our break. There arent many smokers so it was several days before I found a couple. One of the smokers was a woman with that heavy perfume! It was so thick I could taste it and we were outside. Now I know my smoking numbed taste buds should be pretty immune to such things as scented air but I could literally taste her stinky perfume. I moved about 20 feet away down a little path to avoid her scent and enjoy my smoke, when I decided to see how close I could get before it was intolerable. I nonchalantly inched closer till I was a mere 15 feet away, that was the threshold, 15 feet, before my eyes started watering and I had to gag.
So those of you who dont smoke, remember that there are things out there worse than cigarette smoke, how about half a bottle of Charlie!?

Please visit our snack bar, where we offer a wide variety of delicious snacks and drinks. Dont forget the popcorn. Now for our second feature.

My new job is with a non profit organization that deals with the wide and varied world of ceramics. There is the art side we all know and love. A world of brightly colored cups and bowls and vessels and things. Then there is the hard working end of the business, heat tiles for the Space Shuttle and ceramic semi-conductors etc. I work on the website for this organization and it is in the middle of a huge re-design. We are using nice colors, some rounded edges and bright but tasteful design elements. The hue and cry in our design meetings always comes down to the same thing. The argument is made that "our target audience doesnt like style and design". The logic is they are doctors and scientists and professors and they dont care for all the bright colors and design. Today I acknowledged this fact by saying these people remember the LYNX browser. You know, the pre Al Gore internet with no images and just text. The quick reply from my boss was, "Yes they not only remember LYNX but they liked it!". Too bad, I am going to bring them kicking and screaming into the light.

Fresh Heineken

2007-06-23T17:35:00.000-04:00

I live in the country, yes, you already knew that. One of the most annoying symptoms of living in the country is the unavailability of imported beers. I suppose a carry out owner has to stock what he can sell, if that case of Old Speckled Hen just sits on the shelf, then there is little point in ordering it. What is really annoying is when the beer store does stock some nice beers but instead of rotating the stock, that same case of beer will sit till some boob buys it. That boob is often me. I love imported beers with a special weakness for British Ales and German Pilsners and Lagers. Oh a fresh Spaten from Germany, or a nice Bass Ale from Britain, heaven in a pint glass. I just end up being the one eccentric beer drinker in the county that spends 8 bucks and ends up with stale skunk in a bottle.

I also like Heineken, while it is the Budweiser of Europe and the best selling beer in the world. I very much enjoy it's smooth malty flavor. A fresh Heineken is sweet but well balanced with a great hoppy bitterness. The beer is refreshing and has a good alcohol content. That is if it is fresh. Since Heineken is indeed the worlds most popular beer (everywhere but the USA that is) it can be found in our small town grocery stores and carry outs. I just never buy it, because it is almost never fresh. I have actually bought this beer, told the girl at the register I am bringing it back if it is stale and then pop a top in the parking lot in my car. Yes, I have walked right back in and exchanged my stale beer for something more palatable. I even know people that think Heineken is supposed to taste skunky, apparently they drink it to look cool, but do not realize they are ingesting a stale and rotting product.

Today I was in a drive through carry out that boasts 262 different beers. I was somewhat befuddled by the vast array of beers before me when I espied Heineken in cans. Canned Heineken has been around awhile and it is for sale in selected places. While it isnt real easy to find it can be done. I purchased the cans thinking that maybe it was the green glass bottles that caused every Heineken I have ever drank to go stale.

To my delight, the cans were filled with sweet, fresh delicious Heineken. I am sitting here with a decent buzz on just beside myself with joy over finally getting a drinkable beer from the Netherlands. The cans are cool too, heavy aluminum in an odd barrel shape that are fun to hold.

I will probably not have Heineken again any time soon, lord knows for $8.00 I can get a nice beer from anywhere with more flavor and body. It was just nice to drink a fine light European lager that didnt smell like road kill.

Remember these simple beer tips and you wont go wrong.
No fresh beer smells like skunk.
No beer is supposed to taste like ass.
If the beer has dust on the cans, it is likely not fresh.
Beer from Europe has been on a boat for a long time.
Ask your beer store manager how often your favorite import turns over. If he says he hasnt re-ordered since Christmas, stay away and get a Budweiser.
Rare, specialty imports found at the local Circle K are probably not there becuase someone asks for them, more likely they would be overstocks from big city stores, not a good indication of freshness.

I am off to enjoy another fresh imported beer.

A night of Knights near Columbus

2007-06-17T22:38:00.000-04:00

It is time for a new post about bars. Since the last one I have been to a few, but nothing really blog-worthy came up. Sometimes the experience is only more of the same in a bar. Occasionally, there just isn't anything interesting going on. This past Friday night, Daisy and I went bowling with a group of co-workers from her office. They are a good bunch of folks and fun to have drinks with. I bowled poorly, in fact I bowled about as shitty as is possible, but what fun in any case. The bowling alley had been remodeled in recent years and looked modern and clean. This is a shame, because bowling alleys were the among the last bastions of mid century cheesiness. Bowling alleys that had survived from the 50's and 60's retained a soiled schmaltz that fairly screamed years gone by. A bowling alley should smell like old beer, cigarettes, and fried mushrooms. The lounge should have a theme of some sort, like a Tiki bar or have a row of stools along a bar with a formica top, so the effect is a bit like a diner only a lot darker. This particular bowling establishment is actually called the "Tiki Lanes" and I can only imagine what it once looked like. Now however, it is completely re-done and retains little of the classic decor.

The lounge area was clean and modern with ambient lighting and decorative art on the walls. It looked like the cafeteria in a large corporation. I expected to see men in suits and ties, chatting intensely about some deal while wolfing down what nourishment could be obtained by the fare offered. The bartenders were two women, who were pleasant and while a bit slow, efficient enough, but when it came to personality, these two may as well been robots. They didn't laugh or flirt and even though I was tipping well for the first few rounds, they refused to hook me up.

The formula is to go into a new bar, politely chat up the barmaid / bartender maybe introduce yourself, and leave a nice tip. Nothing too extravagant, but make sure to point out they can have a tip if the service is good. These girls kept going to the till to get my change, as if it were some sacred duty to make sure I got all of my change. After the second round, crack a joke or two and smile big, maybe ask the bartender a question about work, like, is this place usually busy on weekends? Then put yourself on their side by commenting on how their job is important, and how you couldnt do it on a busy night. If all goes well you can order your third drink and say "Sell me a rum and coke, mostly rum." or my favorite, "Ill have a seven and seven, mostly seven and you know which one". If you did your job, you are now getting hooked up on the drink. In some cases I have had the bartender trying to kill me with the liquor to mixer ratio.
These girls were measuring the liquor and when I used my "mostly rum" line, I was asked if I wanted a double. No, no thanks, I am trying to get you to hook me up damnit!

The drinks were cheap enough in any case and I started to feel good. After two games it was time to bail and move on. Several of the participants wanted to continue and go to a club to drink some more. I was all for this but deferred to Daisy as she was driving and I was ultimately there to be with her, not carousing in a bar all night. I wouldn't have been as much fun without her anyway. But she was game and when it came time to decide where to go, one suggestion was to drive to the Knights of Columbus lodge. One of our friends had a father that was working the bar at the local K of C that night. She assured us he would "hook us up" and the liquor was cheap in any case.

I learned that the K of C is a fraternal organization for Catholic men. While women were there, they were part of the "ladies auxiliary" (I wonder if they have a band?) but apparently not full on members. This drives Daisy nuts and rightly so, but I get the male fraternal organization thing, it is a hold over from a different time. The K of C was an older building but well maintained and had an aire of recent use. We were shepherded into the bar area, but on the way I could see hallways and passages to other parts of the building, maybe to secret rooms where mysterious rites were performed, perhaps high religious and holy mysticism, maybe artifacts, like famous swords and scepters. But I digress, I did see an open door to a large reception hall with a stage in the front. Acceptable for large Catholic wedding receptions.

I really liked the place, it looked just like any other small bar, neon signs and a big screen TV. There were notices on the walls about activities and fund raisers, all good community minded stuff. There were two trophy cases and inside were mementos of gratitude for some odd community or church achievement. There was also gambling. Yes, gambling. One of our party made no secret about the gambling part and she couldnt wait to participate. Sitting on the back bar were two large fishbowl shaped containers filled with odd little booklets, long and skinny but like a tiny matchbooks with pages. They were "Tear offs" or, more aptly named "Rip Offs". For a buck, you get one of these weird little books to rip off at the perforation to reveal if you are a winner. To be a winner you need a "dog bone" which was just that, an image of a dog bone. It was worth $25.00. One of our party friends won 175.00 just like that and it was on, he kept buying drinks and "rip offs" and winning and I only paid for one drink. That one drink was a mere $1.60, a generous tumbler full of Vodka and mixer, a good drink. For a buck sixty, I could have stayed there all night.

I have several impressions of the Knights of Columbus Lodge. The folks were great, friendly and fun, lots of laughing and smiling. The other patrons were mixed ages but older than us. One couple looked to be well advanced in years. I hope I can still rage when I am 80. It is the sense of community that was evident while I was in there. I was welcome, but an outsider, I wasn't Catholic and I wasn't a Knight. I found myself yearning for some of that community, and the cheap liquor of course. Our bartender was amiable and fun, he was obviously amused at this group of heathens in his bar, and expressed it with his generous drink making. No person, not connected with the K of C was going to come through that door. We were with the daughter of the bartender, and we had a key card, the modern equivalent of a secret password. For regulars, that means everyone is a friend or an acquaintance that might be swilling beer next to you.

I will never be a Knight of Columbus (named for Christopher Columbus by the way, not Columbus, Ohio.). I am not Catholic, and never will be, not that I have anything against Catholics, it is just hard to re-think what you grew up with when it comes to religion. I am a Baptist. We do not have clubs where we can fellowship with other Christians while simultaneously gambling and drinking to our hearts content. Baptists would condemn this behavior as sinful, worldly and enough to keep you out of heaven. This place had a photo of the Parish priest and the top Knight, some Bishop hanging in the entry way! Religion and vice, way to go! God probably doesn't care that much if we have a drink or two. That wasn't grape juice at the famed "water into wine" incident in the New Testament, it was wine and I bet it was good wine too. Nothing short of a divine beer run.

Maybe I can become a Moose or an Elk, perhaps and Eagle. All of which have famously cheap drinks in secret bar rooms with key holes for that all important password. Perhaps I could be an Odd Fellow, and go to that building that has the I.O.O.F emblazoned across the eaves.

I just can't help but admire the K of C and the good solid folks that do good things for the community in the name of Christ, but also allow the worldly part of our human experience to exist, if not outright encouraged, in all of us.

Wor, what is it good for?

2007-06-10T10:30:00.000-04:00

I live in a small town in south central Ohio. We do not have a bad crime problem here, although there is some minor drug trafficking, and some rednecks fighting in bars, for the most part life in my small town is pretty safe and quiet. We do not have street gangs, well, that is what I thought anyway. Several months ago, graffiti started showing up on buildings around town. All of it appeared overnight, indicating that some kids with a can of spray paint were out on a spree. Over a period of a few days, I noticed the letter "W" in red paint, scrawled on dumpsters, sides of buildings, even my own garage got defaced with a scarlet "W". Of course I had no idea what the "W" may have stood for at the time. Maybe "Warlocks" or "Wizards" maybe "William". The graffiti looked similar to gang tags. I once lived in a neighborhood in East San Diego, where Hispanic gangs would "tag" their territory with brightly painted and stylelized logos and iconography. While most was incomprehensible, there were occasional works of art on some overpass that a gringo could understand. The markings eventually would get covered over with some rival gangs signature indicating a turf war, or maybe just competition for the available wall space.

I had never seen gang tags in Circleville, Ohio. That is until the mysterious "W" made it's appearance. One day after the graffiti showed up, I was driving past the abandoned feed mill across from my home. There, emblazoned across a large street facing wall was the now familiar "W" followed by a bold paint scrawl that read "Worriers" I did a double take to make sure I read correctly. It said in plain English, albeit less than straight, "Worriers". I started laughing, I mean this was just rich. Our local gang was the "Worriers". Later that evening I drove my girlfriend past the defaced building and she laughed too. We didn't get a photo that day, and I really wish I had because the next morning, workers that had been converting part of the feed mill into a recycling center painted over the offending tag.

I have the "W" on my garage still, and I get a chuckle each time I see it. I am sure the spelling was supposed to be "Warriors" but these kids were obviously hooked on something other than phonics. The "Warriors" might have instilled some fear and respect into rival gang members entering their turf, however I find it difficult to believe anyone would give a thought to invading the "Worriers" territory.

I can hear it now:
"..Come on Jim, lets go do crimes.."
"..Ok! Wait, Billy, what if we get caught, what if my mom finds out.."
"..Oh you are right Jim, lets stay home and play Uno instead.."
Or from the Circleville chapter of the "blood red crippled gangtas".
"Lets go to the south side and bust some heads"
"Isn't that the'Worriers' turf?"
"Yeah but they are worried about something and unlikely to give us any trouble."

Poor, poor white kids from rural central Ohio, trying to find their identity, and gain acceptance in society by forming a street gang in the only city they know. Outcast from their nice soft beds, in nice suburban homes. Alienated from society for all the usual reasons, like access to good schools, parents who supply three square meals a day and an allowance for spray paint. You know the usual reasons to turn to gang life.

Then there is the spelling issue, perhaps a rival gang could be called the "Websters" or the "Oxford Unabridged" and go about correcting the misspelled gang tags. A big red check mark with the correct spelling next to it.

Apparently I live deep in the heart of "Worriers" territory. Somehow, I am not all that worried.

Addiction vs. Obsession

2007-06-07T00:55:00.000-04:00

I had planned on going fishing this evening, however work and chores got in the way and did not allow me to take advantage of the waning daylight, the gloaming twilight that bass tend to use as dinner time. Instead, after all my chores were done, I started reading bass angling tips online. If you remember an earlier post, I mentioned my renewed interest in fishing, an activity I had eschewed for years but once loved more than life itself. I thought I would freshen up on the latest baits and techniques since it has been over a decade since I fished regularly. Back then there was no Internet. My, my, how the fishing world has adapted to the information super highway.

There is a plethora of information out there. Tonight I reminded myself how to fish a Texas rigged rubber worm, when to fish a top water lure and what colors stimulate strikes at what time of day. I re-learned how to fish certain lures and looked up solunar fishing charts (this week, Friday is best. Next week every day is off the charts). I spent over an hour on one site , that shared pro tournament bass angling tips. I researched the art and science of fishing a "Carolina Rigged" rubber worm and can't wait to try it.

All of these revelations are peppered with memories, like a subtext running while I read. I remember being a younger man, when this particular passion raged within me like a bad smack Jones. For several years when I was a teen; I couldn't wait to be fishing any time, any day, any where. I worked very hard to be a good bass hunter, I read the magazines, talked to fishing buddies, and I practiced all the time. I find myself wanting to do that all over again and I doubt that is healthy.

Just about a month ago I would not have considered "going fishing" a viable form of entertainment for a summer evening. Now I find myself thinking if I get enough work done I can go to the lake! Oh there are worse things, I used to think "If I get enough work done I can go to the bar and try to 'hook up'" but now I just want to wet a line.

The "Black Bass" is a genus that is indigenous to the temperate climates of the world. The freshwater species that is found in ponds, rivers, lakes and streams throughout north America. It does not like the southern hemisphere for some reason but it does like sub tropical locations like southern California and Florida. The Black Bass is divided into 8 sub species in north America. The fish I hunt is the Northern Strain Black Bass, which is divided further into Largemouth and Smallmouth. The bass I want to see on the end of my line has a limited growing season and must spend much of the year in a state of suspended animation due to cold water and even ice cover in winter.

"The largest Black Bass ever caught was over 20 lbs.
The world record bass was caught near Jacksonville, Georgia on June 2, 1932 by George Perry. It weighed 22 pounds 4 ounces and was caught from an oxbow lake off the Ocmulgee River called Montgomery Lake. That is one of the most sough-after records in the fishing world."

Yes, this behemoth was what we like to call a bucket mouth. I have trouble imaging a bass being that big. In Ohio the largest bass I can ever hope to catch is in the 6-8 lbs. range. A 22 lb. bass is the stuff of dreams and legend. The northern strain bass just does not have the growing season it's southern cousin has.

When I was 14 years old, I used to spend my allowance at a bait and tackle store in the small town I lived near. Mitchells Sporting Goods in Greenfield, Ohio. When I got a check for my birthday or I bailed hay for a week, I would run to the store with dollars burning a hole in my pocket. I loved that place, I wonder if it is still the same. They had a model of that aforementioned world record bass hanging on the wall. There was a plaque stating the weight, the angler and the date the fish was caught. After all these years the official record has not been broken and that model is still a representation of the largest Black Bass ever caught. Thinking back, as a young man, I knew I would never catch a bass that large unless I was fishing a more southerly latitude but what an inspiration.

I seem to have a new obsession, since addiction and obsession are so closely related, it is difficult to define one or the other. I think it is more like an obsession. I tend to burn brightly on one thing for a time, learning, mastering, then moving on to another interest, abandoning the one before. It seems odd to me to be so ardent about the sport of fishing again, after all this time. I think I am glad for the renewed interest, fishing is a wholesome activity and doesn't have to be expensive, of course I will make it expensive because that is what I do. I will want the best new lure, or a better fishing rod and reel, or a boat (unngh) but for now, just the act of doing this thing I loved, again, makes me feel young, it puts me in touch with the person I used to be and therefore binds the present with the past in a most satisfactory way.

Perhaps tomorrow will allow me to go fishing.

Immaculate

2007-06-06T09:45:00.000-04:00

Like I don't have anything better to do in the middle of a workday. I am listening to my new satellite radio, on a station called "Fred" that plays early Alternative Rock and I got to thinking about an old tradition among my friends and me. We are pretty much all either musicians or lovers of good music, guitars, stereo equipment. Personally, even though I play guitar some, am more an audiophile than a musician. I was thinking about my list of "Immaculate Albums". This list is very hard to get on and has been around for over 20 years.

The Criteria is as follows. The album must have a strong enough concept to withstand the test of time. Meaning not all the albums on the list are old, but in another 20 years we will still be listening to it. Most of the music on the list however is considered classic at this point. Next, every song on the album must be consistent with the over all work as a whole. In other words each song is great and fits in well with what the artist intended for the entire work. The album should be one of those that you pop in the player and listen to, not skipping through the songs you don't like. My Immaculate albums do not have any clinkers.

Some Albums I would like to put on the list have small flaws, a clinker or an afterthought that some producer put on the record but doesn't fit well into the context of the rest of the work.

The list is totally subjective, I am the arbiter and judge on this list, it is totally mine. However; I would love to hear your list of Immaculate albums. Send them along, and we can all be judge and jury.

There is no "number one" on this list, as all of them could be number one at any given time. It is just a list of albums that have, at least in my ears, a place as essential and perfect in every way.

Here we go.

Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here
Pink Floyd - Dark Side of The Moon
The Afghan Whigs - Black Love
The Cure - Disintegration
Led Zeppelin - Presence
Robin Hitchcock and the Egyptians - Perspex Island
Pure Prairie League - Bustin Out
Neil Young - Harvest
Neil Young - Rust Never Sleeps
Radio Head - The Bends
Guns and Roses - Appetite for Destruction
Beck - Odelay
The Talking Heads - Burning Down the House
The Cocteau Twins - Heaven or Las Vegas
The Blues Brothers - Briefcase Full of Blues
Camper Van Beethoven - Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart
The Cars - Candy O
Johnny Cash - American 2
The Doors - L.A. Woman
Echo and the Bunnymen - Flowers
The Flaming Lips - Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
The Parliament Funkadelic - Greatest Hits
Morrissey - Bona Drag
Nazareth - Hair of the Dog
Norah Jones - Come Away With Me
Kenny Wayne Shepard - Live on
Stevie Ray Vaughn - Couldn't Stand the Weather
Stevie Ray Vaughn - Texas Flood
The Rolling Stones - Exile on Main Street
The Smashing Pumpkins - Siamese Dream
James Taylor - James Taylor
ZZ Top - Tejas
Crosby Still Nash and Young - Deja Vu
Meat Puppets - Too High to Die
Johnny Cash - Live from Folsom Prison
REM - Murmer
Foo Fighters - Nothing Left to Lose
Dandy Warhols - 13 Tales From Urban Bohemia

I am sure I forgot something, but I can always add to it later. Hope you enjoyed my short list of immaculate albums. Now that I have wasted an hour of my workday, I need to put my nose back to the grindstone, while I fire up Itunes and enjoy some of this music.

Chains to nowhere

2007-06-03T13:50:00.000-04:00

Clear back in the early spring, one of the first really warm days actually, Daisy and I were hanging out in her as yet unfinished guest room, I was sipping a beer and she was painting trim around the walls. I was catching a decent buzz and she was happy and just finishing up her painting when the phone rings. Daisy talks to the person on the other line, hangs up and suddenly exclaims that we have a visitor arriving at 6:00 PM. I was a little confused and since it was nearly that time already I raised an eyebrow and waited for the explanation. I sort of had to fish it out of her, while she cleaned up and hurried about in anticipation of the mystery visitors arrival.
It turns out that sometime back she was pressured into accepting a sales call from some company that sells air purifiers. In return for her time, she gets to choose the fabulous vacation of her choice for FREE! Apparently there was no purchase required. The phone call was from the sales dude, having got faulty instructions and needed to confirm the address. While he was on his way back across town, Daisy informed me that I get to deal with him. Oh yay I though, can I be rude? May I mock him? No, no be nice and then get rid of him.
The door bell rings and I answer the door, expecting a man in a suit and tie but am instead greeted by a tall, lanky individual with bright red hair and a flaming red goatee. The gentleman was dressed in a shirt that had what looked like burn holes in it and a pair of jeans and cowboy boots. The over all image was of some redneck nerd gone hormonal.
I invite him in, with some trepidation mind you, as he smiles (I dont think all the teeth were there) and shakes my hand. Daisy comes out of the living room and we gather in the kitchen. I am bemused at his appearance and notice the guy is wearing one of those wallet chains. You know, that emblem of shitkickers everywhere, the obligatory biker / redneck / piercing crowd fashion accessory that doubles as pick pocket prevention.
He starts in with the small talk and tosses a beat up brochure on the counter, the one with a stunning array of spectacular and exotic vacation destinations. He proudly says we are entitled to a vacation and we should choose one right now before we go any further. Daisy, chooses one, just randomly after we make a few jokes about it. With that out of the way our redneck salesman must be feeling encouraged because he becomes animated and starts winding up for the pitch. No sooner had the hot air started blowing and he had barely opened his case, Daisy asks him how long this was going to take. He derailed pretty quick and started to deflect the question but Daisy wouldn't let him. He states that the presentation will take about 2 hours.
As if that weren't enough, Daisy starts asking what the product is and how much. Oh our wallet chain wearing salesman didnt like that at all and Daisy was wielding Occam's Razor with the skill of a butcher.
Finally he breaks down, spills the price, gets told no, and is being massaged out the door. He didnt even get his case open. The conversation briefly turns into a question and answer session about him. I ask if he makes any money selling these things door to door, and how I cannot believe people still make a living at this sort of selling. They dont apparently, or else he would have had on better clothing. However there is that chain guarding his wallet, it could be it is stufffed with cash from all the $3000.00 air purifiers he has sold, right before dinner time, in someones living room.
Or it could be that he just didnt want to leave the house without his favorite fashion accessory, proudly (and loudly) proclaiming the quality of his character, convincing us right away that he and his company can be trusted and we should get out the check book right then and there. If the check made it past the closest state lottery outlet, it sure enough would have been safe in that wallet.

Beer and Bait Drive Through

2007-05-27T21:59:00.000-04:00

There was once a time in my life when I thought fishing was the finest leisure activity known to man. I could write a tome on how excited I got when it was time to go fishing, how amazing the feeling was when some fish ate the bait on my hook and made a run for freedom, only to be thwarted by a thin strand of monofiliment and my will to bring this animal to land. I was addicted to the art and sport of fishing. When I was a younger man, age 12 through 17, I was a fishing fool. Every day the sun shone, no matter what the season, I was likely on the creek bank or plying a local farm pond hunting all of ichthyarchy.
Yes, I was going to be a pro bass fisherman and enter tournaments, I was going to get a sponsor and a fancy bass boat and make my living as a sport fisherman. I took it all very seriously back then, and while I knew it was unlikely that I would ever succeed as such a thing, it was fun to aspire to a goal.

Of course, life got in the way of such aspirations. I got older, married, had children, had to work for a living, but still I managed to wet a line from time to time. After awhile "fishing" read "drinking" as it became an excuse to fill a cooler with beer and take off in the car with a cold one between my legs and the windows open, rock and roll on the radio. There was nothing better than escaping the domestic life at home than to arrive at some pool of water and drink beer while casting about for my submarine prey. In those days, often was the time all I caught was a buzz, and that was enough.

Eventually, I stopped even pretending to be a fisherman, summers past by and I didnt even wet my line once. I forgot the rush of my invisible quarry, hidden till the last moment, biting the lure in a violent and sudden fury. The pull on the line as an easy troll hit a solid, living force determined not to surface. I forgot the peace of spending time at waters edge, the natural beauty and stillness, interrupted only by the song of crickets and the drone of bull frogs. I forgot the serenity I gained from fishing, even if I got nary a nibble, the act of being by the water and quietly hunting fish was sufficient to ground me for awhile, to calm my nerves and make me think of the more important things. When fishing, there are often long blocks of time where thinking is all there is to do.

So today it has been 12 years or more since I have been fishing, longer than that since I was serious about it. Then for no other reason than there was nothing better to do one afternoon, my girlfriend asked if I would like to go fishing at her fathers pond. We left without tackle or even a rod, I was assured her father had gear I could borrow. Sure enough the man had some decent lures and a good rod and reel that he allowed me to use. We arrived at the pond, it is beautiful, surrounded by the hills of south central Ohio and as clear and clean as any spring fed lake can be. In the brilliant sunshine, totally in love with my girl, a slight breeze blowing and a sky an endless vault of Corillian blue, I tossed out a lure and brought her back like I had done so many times. The first cast or two yielded nothing, but the third got a "hit" where some underwater life had actually thought about eating my lure. Eight or ten casts later I had a fish on my line, a juvenile bass came up, he was small and easy to catch, but I was experiencing a re-awakening, a long lost love had come back into my life. I let the fish go, and started again, by the end of the afternoon I had caught over a dozen small fish and one nice one. The bigger bass was about 18 inches and went 2 lbs. Not a leviathan by any means but fun as hell to catch and bring in.
It is funny how a small event can mold and shape ones future. I have since purchased new tackle, cleaned my old, nasty tackle box and bought a new rod and reel. I am now outfitted to fish anywhere any time. I do not know if I will actually find the time to fish regularly, but I hope I do.

My sweetie suggested we buy my new tackle at a small sporting goods store in town. She drove me to the spot and I knew I loved it the moment I saw the place. First off, there were beer signs in the windows. This is always a good sign, meaning the proprietors understand that fishing often means drinking. We walk inside and it smells like a bait store, the odor of a live minnow tank and a refrigerator full of nightcrawlers, overtones of bagged catfish bait and the lingering hint of burly, stinky, drunk cat fishermen that just left. I hit the wall of lures and started making selections. I needed some chartreuse rubber worms and I wanted a selection of Rooster Tails. It was funny how I remembered what kind of artificial bait I needed. I decided to purchase a new rod and reel, I got a nice combo for only $20.00 and thought it was funny how the same rig would have been over a hundo back in the day.

A store where one can drive through and buy bait and beer is a classic combo. I am a big fan of one stop shopping. I remember outfitting for a fishing trip, it always included a stop at the bait store and then another stop at the drive through. Here I could do it all at once, re-fill the cooler with beer, ice it down, get night crawlers and chicken liver, then drive to the lake and enjoy.
The advantages of living with the rednecks in rural Ohio are few, but one has to admit, beer and bait from the safety and convenience of the car is a rare and beautiful thing. I can hardly wait to be beer drinking and bass fishing again. My neck may be a little red after all.

Hurrah for Vodka

2007-05-26T10:14:00.000-04:00

It finally happened, my second favorite vodka in the world is now available in my home town. For years I had to travel to Kentucky to purchase this fine spirit, but today, It can be had for 28 bucks and a drive of about 10 blocks. Titos Handmade Vodka is among the very best in the world. One of my friends described it as giving him the ability to get black out drunk yet feel fine the next day. That is quite a feat for any vodka.
I have tried most of the vodkas that appear on the shelf, some of the "gourmet" specialty vodkas as well as every one of the tried and true brands. I have sipped Gray Goose, and enjoyed Belvedere on occasion. While these fine spirits are tasty and pure, they are too expensive to justify purchasing them on a regular basis, if ever. I believe the best Vodka period is Stolichnaya regardless of price but I seldom have 40 bucks to spend on a bottle (1.74 litre, really why bother with anything smaller). So I come to Titos, made in Texas in a pot still by a man named Tito Beveridge (yes that is his real name). The vodka has a pleasant subtle sweetness but is otherwise very neutral. The finish is soft and silky and has overall great drinkability. Straight this vodka can stand up to the best in the world, mixed it is a potable worthy of the gods.
Kudos also to the Quick Stop, our local liquor store. It is run by a family of Indians, (squishy indians not casino indians) who I found to be quite responsive to my liquor wants and needs. Once I discovered that this brand was available in Ohio, I went searching for it at my store. They didnt have it and I made a request, simply if you stock it I will buy it. Lo and behold, the very next weekend there it was in all of it's 1.74 litre glory.
It is only 10:30 am but I am thinking I might have a nip right now, it is a holiday weekend after all. Titos for breakfast!!

Mountain Time

2007-05-01T01:53:00.000-04:00

Editors note, it has been a month since I returned from my trip and I am just now finishing the blog post. It was started in a hotel room in Salt Lake City.

Day 2
Nothing much happened on day 2, we sat around and eventually went to Nini's a great little restaurant tucked into a neat and sleepy residential neighborhood close to where I was staying. I have been here many times as I nearly alway get breakfast here when I visit the San Francisco area. Just let it be said, the breakfast gods love this place.
After that, we did some shopping. I didnt buy anything but had a good time. Went back to my buddy Jeffs house and we ordered in some Greek food. Slept.
Day 3
The big road trip begins. We covered California, Nevada and half of Utah today. I hadn't been to the Sierras since I was a child and the mountains were breathtaking. Just beautiful. I had told my sweetie back home I would get some desert rocks for the garden while we were traveling and I got my first at a rest stop on Donner Pass, over 7,000 feet up in the mountains. Donner pass still had snow in the shady places, under trees and in folds of the earth. I could tell by the left over rinds of snowfall they get serious snow in the Sierras. I got a nice piece of white granite and a large piece of red granite. I am sure CalTrans wont miss them.
We descended the mountains and came to drier, more desert like terrain. Before we knew it we were in Nevada and buying gas in Reno. I hadnt been to Reno in a very long time. The town has really grown up and modernized since I was last there. They say it is the fastest growing city in the fastest growing state. I never understood why anyone would want to live in Reno, given its altitude and climate but this time I found myself thinking I could live there. San Francisco was only three hours away, yet the cost of living is much more reasonable.

We drove across Nevada, we talked and listened to the satellite radio, no fading and changing of channels, we had radio from space. I became fascinated with the terrain, vast sinks of alkaline waste land that was surprisingly not so lifeless. There was water everywhere, poison to humans of course but I thought it endlessly ironic that there was so much water in this desert. All of these areas have names too, named by the railroad, the early settlers, folks that had to cross this land to reach California in a wagon and on foot.

We left the barren alkaline flats and came to real high altitude desert terrain, miles upon miles of hills covered with blue green sage brush cradling valleys of more said sage brush. Every once in awhile we would pass through a town and since I had googled the route through Nevada, I gave a running commentary on the history of the towns. See, I am intensely intrigued by people that live in these small communities, miles from anywhere. I mean, if you live two hours from Reno, you probably arent commuting, what do you do for a living?

We arrived in Winnemucca Nevada late in the afternoon. It is a clean little city nestled in some mountains that still showed remnants of winter snow. There were casinos, but mostly it just looked like any other town to me. We stopped at a western and tack shop. Jeff wanted to try on hats, and look around at the custom made western wear. I almost bought a book about the black rock desert (black lava rocks everywhere, and even some minor volcanic activity) we had just passed through but decided $20.00 was too much for a paperback. Jeff had struck up a conversation with the woman behind the counter, apparently she owned the place and was very friendly, I listened politely for a bit and finally piped up and asked my question. I asked what do people who live in this area do for a living? She smiled and explained that all there was to do in northern Nevada was work in a mine, or work a ranch. That seemed perfectly logical to me. The photo at the beginning of this blog is of downtown Winnemucca Nevada

One could see mine tailings every few miles up in the hills, I read that most of the nations silver comes from Nevada as well as gold, uranium, and copper. The high desert was beautiful, and stark and unforgiving, yet it has a romance that transcends the ordinary. The sky is so big and blue, the light in the morning and evening is at once brilliant and subdued, depending on the mountain topography.

We then sped out of Nevada, towards West Wendover Nevada. West Wendover is a small city on the edge of the Great Salt Lake Desert, home of the Bonneville salt flats in Utah. West Wendover is the sister city to plain old Wendover Utah. West Wendover is thriving due to low taxes, loose liquor laws, and gambling, while the Utah side has nothing to offer and withers in the parched landscape. In the course of my research I discovered that the residents of these twin cities wish to join up and be in Nevada, and both state legislatures agreed to the deal, however it takes an act of congress to change state lines and we all know how that goes. Thus the Wendovers remain forever twain, one sister healthy the other dying a slow death.

As darkness fell, we found ourselves barreling across the salt flats, nothing much to see or look at, but still pretty cool, just he countless acres of nothingness held a sort of beauty. We rolled into Salt Lake City near 10pm only to find that we had crossed a time zone in the meantime and it was really 11PM. The air in Salt Lake stinks, it is a vile cross between cow shit and swamp gas that frankly shriveled the hair in my nose.

The hotel in Salt Lake was near the airport, and it was nice enough. Both Jeff and I being warm blooded men, know that hotels have the best air conditioning in the world. The first thing I did when I got to the room was crank up the AC. I slept like a log, in my ice cold room in Utah.

I could write more about the trip, but frankly it wasnt that remarkable. I found I loved Wyoming even though there is nothing there. I decided Nebraska sucked ass. Iowa was just non nondescript and by the time we were in Illinois I felt as though I was back home and the ride was a bit boring. The beds in the hotel rooms got worse as we drove east, by the time we got to Indianapolis the beds were hard and lumpy. Each night as we approached the city where we planned to stay the night, I would get hopeful that it would be early enough to find a bar or lounge and catch a buzz, I mean I was on vacation and all. However, each night we had just crossed a time zone and it was too late to do anything. Damn time zones.
I didnt get a chance to view the locals, didnt drink with road weary travelers or hear their stories. I didnt even see anything bizarre as we stayed in name brand hotels and didnt veer off the standard, interstate path.

The most precious part of the trip was time spent with my friend Jeff, I miss him when the years go by and we do not see each other. He is a good man, and I would drive to Mars with him if he asked me to. Mars couldnt be much different than Nevada, mining and ranching.

SLF 5-25-07

No Photo Available

2007-04-28T20:13:00.000-04:00

It has been a long time since I posted a blog entry. I feel slightly ashamed for not keeping up with it to be honest. I have so much to write about, but it frequently seems easier to think about writing than it is to actually sit down and write.
Today, I am on vacation, I am sitting on a patio in San Francisco, California, sipping a rum and Coke and enjoying a beautiful evening. I dont even feel my jet lag, or the fact that I have only had 5 hours of sleep. I am frankly as relaxed as I have been in weeks and it feel pretty good. I miss my girlfriend already, and I just saw her this morning. She couldnt be here with me on this one, so I miss her.

The air here has a special quality that is difficult to name, it is, well.. silky. Yes that is the term, the air is silky. Coming from the midwest, I am used to heavy air. Oppressive with humidity in the summer and harsh with cold in the winter. Here, and every time I have ever visited California, the air is what struck me as being very different from the moment I exited the plane. It wafts in from the coast and swaddles the land in a cocoon of soft warm air, often scented with some tropical flower, or suntan lotion, or just good old bracing sea air.

I have been here many times, I have good friends in the Bay area and it is pretty easy to get on a plane and visit. No rental car needed, no hotel room needed, just a few bucks for liquor and a bite to eat and I am good. Each time I come, my one request is to see the mighty blue pacific. I was born not 5 miles from her blue, endless majesty. I waded in her soft waters from an early age, and the images of the ocean have been indelibly marked on my mind almost from birth.

Today, my friend Jeff drove me to the ocean. It was incredible, the northern coast of California is nothing short of spectacular. The views were endlessly breathtaking and the salt air smelled so good, I wanted to get out and have a tangible communion with this mighty sea. Alas, since it was such a nice day, everyone in the city decided to come out and frolic in the ocean. We couldnt find a place to park! Traffic everywhere that frequently slowed us to a dead stop on the highway. I dont mind too much, the crowds would have diminished my private little communion anyway. I got an eyeful of the sea, and another memory to file away, of the hills and the fog and the breakers and the rocks. The romance of the coast still permeates my soul, even if I cannot get my feet wet.
I wanted to share these spectacular vistas with my girlfriend back in Ohio, but realized I had left the camera at home. So for this day of my trip there are no photos. Yes I am indeed kicking myself in the ass. See on this trip, I am driving back to Ohio with my friend. We leave on Monday morning and will be crossing the West on our trek back to home sweet home. There should be plenty to blog about and I am going to attempt to record it all for this blog.

Day1 The Flight:
The flight was great, not a cloud in the sky and smooth as silk. The aircraft was hauling ass too, and we were 25 minutes early. I sat and read the entire way there, and the 4 hours passed pleasantly. I have only two observations. One was the in flight snack. Once upon a time this seasoned traveler could count on a meal, or a bag of peanuts, or some nice bit of food on a 4 hour flight. However, lately, the snack have been more and more lame. Today we get this package of goodies wrapped in a plastic wrapper with Delta Airlines proudly emblazoned on the front with "ENJOY" printed in giant font on the front. Inside were some raisins, a very small box like you would give your small child. Additionally, there was a package of two (2) short bread cookies as well as a small tub of cheese product. No really, it said Havarti flavored pasteurized cheese food.
There was a small plastic knife and a bag of crackers that said on the package, "garlic herb crustinis". Oh great, cheese and crackers, I thought, until I opened the package. The "crustinis" were about the size of the raisins. Small little crouton like bits that while good, did not provide anywhere near enough real estate to smear Havarti flavored cheese like food on them. Not that I didnt try mind you, I am sure it looked pretty ridiculous to see me trying to smear cheese like substance on my tiny bit of flavored bread.
The only other thing that was notable on the flight was the number of folks that had to use the bathroom. I mean really, from the moment the seat belt light went off folks were jamming the aisles trying to get back to the can. Now the flight wasnt even crowded, I even gave myself an upgrade to a better seat once the aircraft was in flight, and I happily sat there, enjoyed two Coka Colas and read a book. I did not have to pee. However, everyone else on the flight did. It was an endless procession to the restroom for 4 hours. I dont know, perhaps it was something in the water. I wonder if any of THAT waste was jettisoned onto a server farm somewhere.
More on the trip later, and I promise to have photos.
SLF 04-28

Over the shoulder

2007-03-03T09:35:00.001-05:00

I have spent some time recently working on my blog, I have not been a great, or prolific blogger so far, but I have managed to craft a decent template design. Yesterday, I read over some of my older posts. Some I like and others not so much, it is interesting to see what I was feeling on the day I wrote, and remember what was going on in my life at that moment. I believe that is largely what blogs are for, while they can be entertaining, they are at least as much a public diary of sorts, a journal. The early posts were mostly regarding my then new relationship with my current girlfriend. My emotions were running strong and free and I felt compelled to write about it. Since then I have not written about my lover as much. We are in a stable relationship, very much in love and doing fine with big plans for the future. However; the gushing has dried up for the most part, I am not sure why this happens but really, one cannot keep up expending that much emotional energy forever. I like where I am these days. I still believe she is the one I have looked for all these years. We are still best friends and lovers. We share private jokes and can communicate with just a look, or a smile. A day never passes that we do not express our love for each other in some way, simple or more elaborate, it is always sweet.

I occasionally let my demons haunt me, as does she, and at 40 we have some demons to exorsize, the key is to successfully overcome the fears past experiences have planted. Back in those first heady weeks, I often did a gut check, I asked myself in point blank terms: "Do you love her? " I did this because I was scared to fall in love again, and I was weighing the risks vs. the rewards. I am glad I took the risk, it has been over six months now and I could not imagine life without her, well actually I could and I don't like what that life looks like.

Last night, before sleep, that intimate time of day when we are together without any distractions, the beautiful interval when we talk sweetly and exchange little kisses, she asked me why I loved her with all my heart. The statement wasn't weighty or the prelude to a long discussion, just a light question. I chose two reasons and that was the end of it, but I wanted to elaborate just a bit at this time in our lives together to publicly state why I love her so much.
My girl is pretty, beautiful even, the very sight of her still makes my heart skip a beat and I imagine she always will. She is kind, and generous, she possesses a compassion for others that I sometimes lack. She treats me very well, with a meal at the end of the day, listens to me blather on about my business, she often signals her love with very simple things that mean so much. Like a tender touch, or a meaningful look, or even just thinking of me when getting up to get something from the kitchen. She loves me for who I am, and that is the greatest gift of all for me. I am so imperfect, I have my demons, my passions, my attitude, and she loves me despite all that. Some days I don’t love myself very much. I continually try to improve, that is what humans strive to do, but she loves me right now, today. That is more than I could ask of anyone, and all I need.

We also share a common chemistry, she and I mix well. That in itself is a potent combination that I believe a lifetime may be built upon. I hope to spend the rest of my life with this remarkable woman, she makes me whole and balances the parts of me that tend to veer off the road. Mostly, I am content and happy when I am with her, and miss her when I am away.
So looking back, I realize all those feelings are still there, maybe more mature but certainly deeper. We have proved we can survive into this stage of the relationship.

A friend of mine that reads this blog said that I have “written a book” about my girl, referring to all the blog entries from last fall. Reading those entries and comparing those feelings to what I feel now serves to reinforce my conviction that she and I are real, that the dream lives and that today, over six months since we met, I love her more than ever.
I have nothing but my future, my past is fragmented and full of mistakes. My past has got me in trouble and sown seeds that bore thorny fruit that I still live with. My future however is very bright and it is a future I want very badly. A future made wonderful with Daisy.
slf 03-07

The Devil and My Muse.

2007-03-02T00:56:00.000-05:00

Oh look! He changed his blog design again! Well this time for real, I hope you like it as I sure do. It is late and I am going to sign off, but maybe now I am inspired enough to write in this thing more often and create some decent content for your enjoyment and my catharsis.
I am still figuring out the code in the blogger template but at least now it looks like a web designer owns this blog. Enjoy.

Party Pizza

2007-02-28T15:03:00.000-05:00

I was shopping one day last week and didn't have alot of money to spend. It was one of those quick shopping trips that are designed to pick up a few things, in a hurry and just want to get home and eat a bite. I had my daughters with me and there was nothing but outdated milk and some marinated artichokes in the fridge. So we plan a surgical strike, get in and get out, plan what we are going to buy before hand, no dawdling. We started off well, deciding to eat cheese burgers for dinner. Lettuce, tomatoes, an onion and some buns. We are doing really well now, got a box of cereal and a bottle of ketchup on sale, moving into the meat aisle, I spy a good looking package of ground chuck from 10 yards away and whisk it into my cart. So far so good, then unexpectedly while on my way to the cheese cooler, I espied a display of frozen pizza. There were bags of pizza, frozen in little squares, and my daughter exclaimed "Look daddy! School pizza!" Well I was intrigued and stopped to look at them. They were packaged in an industrial manner, just crammed into a generic plastic bag with some initials on them. They were indeed square little shit shingles, just like I remember pizza being back in the day. The rectangular blobs of dough, covered with cheese substitute and pools of grease. We used to put ketchup on them back in school. I decided they weren't indeed the "real" school pizza and we left them. However, now frozen pizza was on the mind. After grabbing some cheese for my burgers I stopped by the frozen food aisle and priced frozen pie. Totinos Party Pizza was only a buck a piece. That is not too bad for a frozen pie. However, right next to them were Jeno's and Tony's frozen pizza. One was $.99 and the other was only $.89 cents. What a deal, so I compared ingredients, none of them had real cheese, you know, that swirly symbol on the corner of your favorite food packages that indicates "Real" cheese? Then I got to wondering about the meat, the sausage looked pretty suspect and the pepperonis were just little cubes. I ended up getting the higher priced Totinos becuase I liked them once long ago, like Ramen noodles they were a cheap staple back in the day when cheap nourishment was a priority.
Back home the next day, I thought I would go ahead and make a couple of them for dinner. In they went, to a 450 degree oven. 7-9 minutes later they came out steaming and crispy. However when the light hit the top of the pie it appeared to still have the plastic wrap on them. I looked around and saw where I had indeed taken the inner wrapper off. It turns out the "cheese" had a glossy sheen to it that is not found in nature. Of course we ate the pizza anyway, and actually enjoyed our laminated pizza like food. Although mine was really a delivery mechanism for the tobasco sauce I dumped all over each slice.
Here is to "Party" pizza, because I am certain it tastes better after one has been partying.
slf 02-07

Change is good.

2007-02-28T01:25:00.000-05:00

I can't seem to decide on a blog design. I am a website designer by trade and one would think I would have the best blog modification out there. Sadly, there is no time to mess with it. I have to retro-engineer the code to make it do what I want. There are only so many hours in the day. I believe I finally have a design I can live with for awhile. Now that it is almost 2AM, I managed to spend the entire evening working on this one.
My girlfriend recently had her blog rated by a group of blog critics. She got a 10 out of 10 for design and content. Way to go Daisy! I love you! I was therefore inspired to do something with my blog, as sad as it was, a change was needed. I will probably never be a blog superstar like my girl, but at least I can make someone smile once in awhile and maybe enlighten in some small way.
So here is another design, it will change again no doubt. Enjoy.

Dive Bars

2007-01-31T21:17:00.000-05:00

Someday, I wish to write a book or journal about bars, bar culture and bar history. I love bars, and I have given some thought as to why. It is so much more than just the drinking, one can drink very effectively and economically at home. No, to be in a bar be it sipping on a relaxing cocktail or madly power drinking the draft beer special, there are stories, and people and atmosphere surrounding the activities that happen within the confines of a bar. Of course all bars differ in their intent, some are classy places with an eye to the upscale cocktail connoisseur, you know, the black tie piano bar sort of place. Then there are the sports bars, where working men and women go to throw back a few drinks after work or watch the big game on Sunday surrounded by big screen TV's and sports Jerseys hanging on the walls. Some bars are called clubs, where one goes to "hook up" , get and eyeful of each other and if there is enough alcohol, dance. I have always called this sort of bar a "meat market". Sometimes a bar is really a restaurant that sells alcohol. Other times the place is a bar that serves food. In my quest to chronicle bars and bar culture, I realized I need a working definition of what an individual bar is in reality. I have decided to focus my attention on the dive bar, that little place on the corner that has been there for decades. A place your grandfather may have talked about, a place with stories to tell, and cold beer to serve.

What is a dive bar?
Generally speaking it is a small, older bar, it seems that a bar has to decline before it becomes a dive. The bathrooms are small and smelly, the bar is old and scuffed up, the clientèle is working class and the juke box features country music, and beer drinking rock and roll that is 15 years out of date. You know the music I am talking about, AC/DC, Van Halen, Def Lepard. A dive bar can never be a restaurant, but may occasionally sell food. If a true dive bar sells food, it is deep fried and made in a converted mop closet. A good dive needn't be dangerous but sometimes they are. A dive bar typically has a good looking bartender at night, and a not so good looking one during the day. These bars are open in the morning, and stay open till the legal closing time. None of these wimpy midnight or one A.M. closing times for a good dive bar, this puppy will be closed for a whopping 4 hours in our state. Closed at 2 open at 6.
I must admit I have never been in a dive bar at 6 A.M. but I wish to try it sometime. Just go in and order a beer, and the "breakfast sandwich" that is prepared in a micro wave in the mop closet. It would be pretentious to order a bloody mary at a dive bar in the morning. The dives in my town are typical of the genre, they are mere watering holes, places to get a drink, cheap and quick most of the time but come the weekend, or after 5 P.M. they liven up and become almost clubs, in that there are folks trying to party, people trying to forget, men and women trying to hook up. Some of the best times I have ever had on a Saturday night where had at a small dive bar.

Dive bars often smell like Pine Sol, they always smell like old beer, and stale cigarette smoke. Add a few dozen drinkers with all their perfumes and colognes and it becomes a pungent scent indeed, and will instantly bring back memories of dive bars past the moment you get a whiff. Biker types go to dive bars, some dive bars even cater to the biker crowd. I have drank side by side with biker clubs out for the afternoon and they are fine, I usually get a free drink. In a dive bar the selection is usually not very good, as far as the beer and liquor available for consumption. However, this is not always the case and cannot be used as the sole indicator of the dive rating of a bar. There will always be Jim Beam, and Jack Daniels, if you look real hard they may have some rot gut that the old timers drink. Dive bars stock what sells, so these days you will see many bottles of vodka on the shelf, but not so much gin. Wine is almost never found in a dive bar with the possible exception of the wine that comes in miniature bottles with a screw top.

Happy hour at a dive bar starts early and ends late, one of the best happy hours in my town starts at 3pm and goes till 7pm. Draft beers in the large 22 oz. glass are only $2.00. I can put away a lot of $2.00 beer in four hours. Some of the best happy hour prices are to be had at small dive bars so be sure to stop in and have a cold one with the boys one evening after work.

Dive bars always have a pool table, sometimes they have a dart board. You will seldom see anything fancier than that, but occasionally there will be a “Golden Tee” console near the door. Some bars bring in live music on the weekends. These are some of my favorite times, to see a live band and get wasted on cheap liquor. If a bar brings in a band you have actually heard of outside the bar circuit, it is not a dive bar.

One of the best features of this type of bar is the family atmosphere, I don’t mean it is ok to bring the kids and prop the baby up at the waitress station, what I am talking about is the kind of esprit d corps that develops over time. The same folks come in night after night or week after week and friendships are made. Many times the bartender is also the bar owner, and this adds to the family feel of the place. Not all dive bars share this special attribute, some are downright unfriendly and mean. Still it is likely there is still a familial aspect to the place just a mean family.

Recently I took a whirlwind tour of three of Lancaster’s dive bars. I visited each one long enough to enjoy two beers. I tried to visit the restroom in each one as well. Here are my impressions.

Leo’s Bier Haus:

This place is fascinating, it dwells on a busy main street and has a porch around the outside walls. The building looks every bit of it’s century of life. Upon parking on the busy main street, I had to walk around to the side door where there was a ramp and the main entrance. The place was long and narrow and fairly dark, it didn’t smell like Pine Sol so much as just years of partying.

I was immediately struck by the bar and back bar. It was magnificent, long and stretching nearly the entire length of the main hall. While it was festooned with tacky beer signs, bumper stickers and other silly doo dads, I could still see how beautiful this antique was. There was an original mirror in the back and large pillars reaching all the way to the ceiling, at one time they were probably 14 feet tall but today the ceiling is lowered with cheesy acoustic tile. There was a good crowd at Leo’s Bier Haus, it was roughly 4pm on a Saturday afternoon. I noticed there weren’t any liquor bottles on the big, pretty back bar and soon realized they had a beer only license, also the beer selection was pretty lame, three domestic brands on tap and a dozen or so brands in bottles. I was hoping with a name like Leo’s Bier Haus, I could expect rich dark German beers flowing from pewter schooners and buxom beer maids to deliver it. Such is not the case. There was a very warm family atmosphere in this bar, clearly a neighborhood joint and everyone knew each other. I spoke with the bar tender briefly who also owns the joint. She bought it from her father who owned it for over 30 years. She said the building had always been a bar. Taking the long view of this place it was probably a hub for working class men, that would hit it after work in the mill or factory. Over time it became more of a neighborhood hang out.
I got a Budweiser draught, it was served in a frosted mug and was fresh and cold. The price for the 12 oz. mug was $1.75.

The Fairview Inn:

This place is a classic, almost not a dive bar, since it is steeped in tradition and history. Much of that history is retained and is visible at this old bar. This place is called the Fairview, not because the view out the window is “fair” but because it is directly across the street from the Fairfield county fair grounds. So there is indeed a view of the fair, and thus the Fairview inn. The first thing one notices is the antique neon sign hanging outside, the piece looks to be original to the building and has a wonderful patina that only comes from age and years of being in the weather. The sign works too, and is lit every night.

Once inside I was struck by how small the place is, there are several rooms in the back of the main bar room, I found a barstool and sat at the bar. There are also several small booths along the east wall. This bar didn’t smell like Pine Sol, but rather of Ozone, this O3 odor was coming from a medium sized “smokeeter” hanging on the wall. I found this to be a cruel twist of irony since this bar has chosen to enforce the recent state wide smoking ban. Perhaps it was churning away to freshen the hot air coming from the patrons.

At 3:30 in the afternoon, the bar was doing a fair business, the crowd was mixed with men at the bar and a group of women in a booth. The back bar here is quite remarkable with the main feature being the original walk in cooler, and the old wooden doors that allow access to the cooler. Many brands of domestic and imported beer are displayed on shelves just inside the doors, the backlighting accentuating the chill condensation around the glass. There was a great selection of liquor to be had with the usual emphasis on vodka. Top shelf drinks were $4.00, I enjoyed a Blue Moon on tap that was served in a 12 oz. frosted beer mug with the traditional orange slice. I paid $2.00 for this luxurious potable.

There is a sign over the front door proclaiming the Fairview has been serving guests since prohibition. I like this bit of history, in fact the place may have once been an actual “inn” since there are living accommodations above the bar, probably rented as apartments today. There was a wide screen TV, I did not notice a juke box but I assume there was one. The bathrooms were clean but small. I would like to spend a quiet weeknight with a friend drinking and talking the night away in this place. It is a great neighborhood hang out and only barely qualifies as a dive bar.

Sweeny’s:

Here is another bar that was once something greater. There is a grand bar and back bar that probably seats 40 drinkers and extends nearly from front door to rear. The main bar room has 18 foot ceilings that are clad in their original tin tiles. The floor is wooden and it just looks like a brawling 19^th century saloon. The back bar is incredible, overlook the odd garnishes taped hither and thither, and the grandeur of a time long forgotten becomes clear. A massive mirror serves as the back drop surrounded by solid, quarter sawn oak.

The liquor selection was average at best, and the beers were domestic. Sweeny’s doesn’t really know what it is, the bar owners are trying to pass it off as an Irish pub, but putting some shamrocks on the walls and a Guinness sign does not an Irish pub make. They do not even serve Guinness, or Harp. They did have a bottle of Jamisons but not Bushmills. There was a jukebox, it was wired to a dial up connection, so if the song you wanted wasn’t available on the machine, it would go out and search a database and retrieve it for you. The problem here is the dial up, one gentleman had been waiting on a song the entire time we were there. The music selection was average for the genre, the good old boys playing euchre at the end of the bar were complaining about the 80’s rock and roll coming out of the machine.

I ordered a draft beer, it was cold and delicious but was served in a clean but non frosted mug. The bartender was a young woman, who smoked like a chimney, but looked pregnant, perhaps she was just pot bellied and smoking. I questioned her about the history of the place, she didn’t know much but assured me it had been there for as long as she could remember, that accounts for 10 years anyway. The entire time we where there, a cadre of partiers at the west end of the bar were catching a nice buzz and having a good time. Half the group was suddenly in a hurry to leave and one of the gentlemen in the party had just ordered a beer, rather than gulp it down, he gave it to me explaining he hadn’t touched it. So even though it was Bud Light it was free and I drank it.

If Sweeny’s dropped the Irish pub attempt, or even embraced it, one or the other it would be a spectacular drinking establishment.

I have since visited two more bars, and this foray into the wilds of Lancaster’s drinking establishments has just begun, think of this essay as only a reconnoiter exercise. I hope after reading about my adventures, you will be inspired to grab a $20.00 bill and go leave it at the dive bar of your choice.

Blue bombs: death by frozen fecal material (an unlikely odessy) .

2007-01-31T00:47:00.000-05:00

Today was a work day in hell, and not just your garden variety hell fire and brimstone mind you, but a day in the seventh level of Dante's inferno. As some of you know, I am a web site developer and Internet consultant. Basically I build websites for companies. I am good at it and I make a good chunk of change hosting websites as well. However, I do not own my own server. Heaven forbid it, I wouldn't want to. I lease servers in their individual climate controlled, security monitored, and hyper connected buildings in places far away for a few hundo a month. So one of my big servers is located outside Philadelphia Pennsylvania. I have a nice deal with an honest hosting company, a good man owns it and he is far from "rinky dink" with `10,000 servers under his control, overall a good deal on fairly high end service. I pay a monthly lease payment and then resell the space and bandwidth to my clients.
The last two weeks I have busted my butt to build, produce and deliver a high profile set of three websites for a national brand of insurance. I was contracted through a marketing firm that has in turn contracted with the big brand. They are fairly clueless, regarding the process of building a website and I was more than happy to host the site for them. Hosting, you see, is easy money most of the time and easy to sell as an addition to the website construction. The machines keep the websites visible to the public and I sit around and collect fees for watching paint dry. Once in awhile the paint doesn't dry correctly and all hell breaks loose. This is what happened overnight and today (Tues Jan 30).
Last night I was peacefully dozing in my bed, almost asleep as I worked till midnight and had only recently gave up for the day. The phone started ringing, at first I didn't want to acknowledge the fact someone was trying to reach me, and I let it ring. Then in rang again, this incessant noise was demanding my attention. I got up and groggily stumbled to the phone in the dark, and missed the call actually. Upon reviewing the call history, I saw that it was one of my programmers and business partners. I immediately called back and asked what was so important she had to call at 12:20 AM.
I learn at this point that the server had to be moved and I had to make a decision on how to handle the situation right that moment. Folks, I was sleepy, grumpy and in no way qualified to make any big decisions at that moment. My first reaction was "fuck that" lets deal with it in the morning after a good nights sleep and some coffee. As she droned on about the problem it became apparent that something had to be done immediately, as the large project I had bled for the last two weeks was due to be proof edited by the large insurance company at 9am that morning. It was indeed crunch time. Within a few moments I got a call from the owner of the server farm and was informed of the situation. The situation was beyond crazy, it was ludicrous in the extreme, my poor brain could hardly wrap itself around it. What happened, to make my life a living hell for the next 20 hours was this. A large chunk of ice fell from a passing aircraft. It fell to earth with enough velocity to hit one of the air handling units on the roof of my data center. The unit promptly crashed through the ceiling upon impact an was hanging on the rafters. Now keep in mind this is a serious building, one cannot get into the server room without thumb print recognition and all the appropriate credentials. Very secure.
The owner calls the local building inspector and the insurance adjuster to take a look. The building inspector immediately orders an evacuation of the building as it is deemed unsafe with a two ton air conditioner hanging on by some unseen force through a hole in the buildings roof. A tarp is placed over the hole and the insurance adjuster is then charged with the investigation of what actually happened. It seems a chunk of ice, roughly three pounds after entry, had fallen from a height of 35,00o feet to demolish the roof. This ice was "blue ice" from an airline lavatory. Apparently it still had turds and toilet paper ensconced within it's frozen form. In layman's terms, a giant hunk of ass water just fell from the sky and wreaked havoc on the parade. All of several hundred servers had to be moved to the new data center about 60 miles away. The server company had been in the process of moving all the servers to the new location at the time, mine was one of the unfortunate ones left in the old building.
So to make a very long story shorter, the owner personally took my physical box to the new building, put it in a rack and plugged it in. Needless to say nothing worked at first and I have been all day making phone calls, placating clients, testing connections and otherwise being miserable. There is nothing so bad as having websites down all over the country because of a server outage.
My team and I eventually got everything going again, and it became a waiting game, waiting for all the connections to solidify and propagate throughout the world wide web. I went to my local pub and ate a late dinner and many beers. The hard part is over, and I have happy customers again, but that errant bomb of turds really fucked with my day and the day of many others. I dont know if it is legal to jettison human waste over a populated area, but this load of shit did a number on us terrestrial peons this day. Should the heavens not open up and deposit anything more than rain for the rest of my life, I will be happy.
slf 01-30-07

Smoking in the Free World

2006-12-15T10:14:00.000-05:00

Well, I am finally in a position to sit and write some new blog material. It has been a busy month or so since I last posted. Not that I have a vast following of readers mind you, but still, I blog for the fun of it and if someone else enjoys my words then so much the better.

Last month, our esteemed electorate voted to ban smoking in all public indoor spaces throughout the state. The measure passed with 68% of the vote. I am appalled that almost 2/3 of my fellow citizens are willing to outlaw a legal activity and violate my rights as a smoker. To be honest, I don't really feel as though I have "rights" as a smoker but I can indeed legally buy and consume tobacco as I see fit for the most part. Tobacco is not a controlled substance after all. The real losers are the business owners, men and women that own and operate bars and restaurants specifically.

I have a friend who owns a bar, he is a good guy and has worked hard to make his pub the best in town, he tries very hard to compete and stay ahead of the game. In my small town, smoking and drinking go hand in hand, it is difficult to separate the two activities, I mean in most peoples minds the two are synonymous even if one doesn't smoke. I asked my friend how he felt it would impact his business, he said he didn't know, but wasn't too happy that the government just told him what he could do in his own damn building. That is the real injustice of the new law. If I own a building that is open to the public it is up to me to decide what happens there. If it is ladies night then women get discounted drinks, if I want to paint the walls chartreuse, or cater to gay men then that is my right and my choice. My building, my business, my decision. I fail to see how smoking (once again a legal activity) is any different than other aspects of running a private business.

See, no one is holding a gun to the consumers head and saying "you must go to this smoky bar", on the contrary, if I am that offended by smoking I can choose to drink or dine in a non smoking facility. Guess what? If enough people do go to the non - smoking bar the others will follow suit to stay competitive. Huh? Free market democracy deciding policy in privately owned business'? No way.

Smoking is not good for you, we all know that. Smoking kills, and causes difficult and painful health problems as well. There isnt a smoker alive that doesnt know these things and is keenly aware of the need to quit or get sick someday. Still, it is an addiction comparable to heroin and cocaine, the difference is I can walk to the "quick mart" and get an entire carton of my drug and get my "fix" as I walk back home. What about second hand smoke, you ask? Lets be completely honest about it, if you choose to spend time in a smoky bar, once a week lets say, you are not getting enough carcinogens to make one iota of difference to your health. There is little solid evidence that second hand smoke causes any health problems despite what is promulgated in the press. Walk down a busy city street and inhale the clouds of exhaust, work near a factory belching chemicals, drink the water coming out of the tap, all these things have harmful elements in them but no one is shutting down driving cars.

The number one issue that really chaps my ass is this. To get the ballot initiative passed, a bunch of people had to sit around and think of it. Then they had to pass around a petition to get it on the ballot, then raise money to shove it down our throats in the form of campaign commercials and other media. What the hell do these people do for a living? Don't they have better things to do than sit around worrying about where I smoke? Get a grip people, I dont sit around worrying about how much coffee you drink, or how much money you spend at the track, I dont concern myself with how flatulent you are in the morning on the bus, nor do I sit and think up legislation that would outlaw that nasty perfume you wear that makes my eyes water and my gag reflex start up while I stand beside you at the checkout counter. Lets make it illegal to scratch off lottery tickets on the premises, that is offensive to me, or better yet while I am waiting for your gambling ass to get out of the way while you lose your dollar, I should be allowed to light up to kill the time.

I am an addict, true enough, and I need to stop smoking or I will die, true enough. That is hardly the point, as even if I were not a smoker I would still feel just as strongly about this suppression of freedom at the hands of holier than thou do gooders. If you do not like smoke filled atmosphere in the bar, go to another one that doesnt allow smoking. How bloody hard can it be?

I know it's only rock and roll... but I like it!

2006-11-05T09:39:00.000-05:00

The Twilight Singers
Southgate House, Newport, Ky
November 3, 2006

Back in the 90's when the world was new and dinosaurs roamed the land, there was a popular local band that called themselves the Afghan Whigs. They were a standout in a sea of competing proto-bands that formed an early 90's class of musicians in the Cincinnati music scene. I had friends that were in bands during that time, so I saw the Whigs, and many others both on and off stage. I remember seeing printed paper flyers stapled to sign posts and telephone poles promoting the latest gig at such spots as Sudsy Malones on Vine st. The Afghan Whigs scored a record deal and started a climb out of obscurity to hit a national stage. While the history of the band is beyond the scope of this blog post it is important to note my connection to the scene in those days.

I remember hearing the tongue in cheek rumour that Greg Dulli, the leader of the band, had sold his soul to the Devil and that is why they were so successful. I wonder which crossroads this deal might have gone down on, Gilbert and Macmillian Ave? It is funny just how pervasive this rediculous bit of gossip was at one time. While Mr. Dulli did trade in a brand of soulful slease, I doubt Beelzebub had any thing to do with it.

The Whigs came and went, and broke up officially in 2001. I have been a fan since the old days and collected all their albums, to this day I love to throw in "Black Love" and turn the volume all the way up. Enter "The Twilight Singers" the latest incarnation from Dulli and company.

I own both studio albums and they are both very good. So when it was announced that they would be playing at the Southgate House, my friend PC Badass and me were all over it. Now the Southgate House is a blog post all it's own. I have been there several times in the last 20 years or so, I have many memories of this venue, albeit hazy ones since there was always alot of alcohol involved. The place is a Cincinnati / Newport landmark, being a historic property and also as a long standing new music venue. Larger shows are always in the "ball room" a 1930's addition to the 19th century house where the lounge is located. The ball room is cool and one can still imagine the grandness of it at one time, but now there is a patina of decadence, squalor and decay that nearly obscures what it must have been like at one time, think the Newport Music Hall in Columbus. There is a balcony two thirds of the way around the large open space on the ground floor that provides excellent views of the stage. We were seated right above right stage and had a very good view. I was encamped in a decrepit vinyl covered chair that like all the others in the gallery, seemed to have had asses in it since the place played host to grand balls, and catered to the Newport gambling scene, the Sin City Era. It was perfect. (take a moment to read the content at that link, absolutely fascinating, in a sleasy sort of way, much of Newport's history seems to be buried, just like the new, clean city of today, is but a veneer over the much more organic and frankly more interesting past.)

The show opens with the piano player from the Singers, I missed this fact at first but the badass pointed it out later in the show. This opening act was quite amazing as it was a one man show, but he was able to produce a full band sound by sampling his own guitar in real time then looping the groove while creating another.

The next act "Stars of Track and Field" took the stage wearing all black and sporting ascots. I found this pretty amusing but a nice touch nonetheless. This band did a very nice job as a power trio, the drummer handled loops on a Mac while integrating his live percussion duties. One of the guitarists also played the keyboard. The lead singer would riff on a wall of sound style groove then kick into a lead part all the while jumping and gyrating spastically about the stage. It was good showmanship. To my ear the bands influences sounded like "Sterolab", post 'The bends' Radiohead, and some "Smashing Pumpkins" thrown in for good measure. I very much enjoyed the sound of this band and would recommend them in the future.

Finally, after a long pause in the action, our mainline act arrived on stage. Greg Dulli and the boys were in top form, although I thought the vocals were buried in the mix on some songs. The crowd was boisterous and into the set. The music was tight and inspired, with a mix of songs from both albums, a good show. Dulli was his soulful, sleasy self and the other band members were rocking with verve. After about 80 minutes it was over, and the band left the stage.

There was a pause, the crowd seemed to quiet down, maybe expecting another set, or an encore. It seemed to me to be just a sigh after a very good hour and a half of show. It turns out our little rest was mis interpreted by the band and made some news in a small way in various blogs. The crew started unplugging the amps and packing up the gear. Most of the folks were standing pat, cheering, finishing drinks, and chatting among themselves. Finally, the badass and I decided it was over and sought to outrun the 500 or so people that were about to make a break for it.

Starving, we made our way to a frou frou, pretentious restaurant that served upscale Asian cusine. We ordered a rather passable Pad Thai, and dined in cheesy faux splendor at 2AM in Newport. Try that 30 years ago, it would have been a Waffle House or a hole in the wall shit on a shigle joint. I think I would have prefered the later.

There was a cab ride back to the hotel, and some minor adventures trying to find snacks and soda pop at 2:30 AM in downtown Cincinnati, but that is probably better left for a new blog entry. Still smarting over the encore issue, we chilled out and discussed the show in the room. It was assumed that becuase Dulli has connections and roots in Cincinnati we would have been treated to a fabulous encore, and maybe even some Whigs material. It turns out that this attitude of entitlement is what got the crowd at the Southgate House in trouble. I later found a blog entry on the Twilight Singers site that explains it in the bands words. Encore O Rama.

All in all, I am very pleased with the show we got, and even though I missed an eventual encore with only the singers and a piano, I feel like I got my moneys worth and a rocking good time. Rock and roll is fun, dont forget as you get older just how fun rock and roll can be. I am 40 and have been rocking for a very long time. This was rock and roll at its raw and wonderful best, yeah I know its only rock and roll but I LOVE IT!

slf 11-06

The Scorched Earth

2006-10-25T09:21:00.000-04:00

There was a time in my life in the days after my 12 year marriage failed, after the months of mourning the loss of my wife and reconciling the betrayal she visited on me. The months of anger, and crying, and despair when finally I started looking for another special friend, got back out there as it were, to find a girlfriend. I dated fairly often, nothing too serious at first. I first dated some local women that seemed interested back when I was wearing a wedding band. It is interesting to note that there were days when I regretted that band of gold, but I walked the line, I never cheated, and when I did get a chance to date these women it still went nowhere.

Eventually, I discovered online dating and never looked back, I found that it was easier than going to bars, and since I didn't belong to any civic organizations, nor did I attend church there really weren't going to be many situations where I might meet a nice woman. I mean honestly, my friends would rattle off the cliche: "You will meet her when you least expect it, in the grocery store or something" well that never happens. I can see it now, while weighing the pros and cons of ground chuck vs. ground round the woman of my dreams would suddenly appear, reaching over my shoulder to pluck a pound of ground beef, when our eyes would lock and love would bloom right there over the meat counter, dead hunks of beef flesh bearing mute witness to the occasion. No, online dating was the way to go and since I make my living on the Internet it was very convenient.

I started slow, the seduction was different online, I chose to be completely honest about myself and I suppose most people do when they participate in online dating. I wanted to represent myself honestly so when we finally met the product advertised is what they got. I had a few dates that turned into a pattern of short 4-6 week affairs. Nothing serious. Over time I started calling the online dating service the "pussy mill" (sorry ladies, I was in a single mans place for awhile). Then one day I met a fabulous woman, she and I got along very well and the first date was amazing to say the least. We chatted for a few weeks then graduated to phone calls then of course we met and a relationship started.

It was a good relationship, but I was crushing very hard on this woman, I called it love at the time although I never stated it, nor did she. One day by remote control, I got a phone call the break up call. She no longer wanted to date me. I was sad, and angry, and spent several days in a fugue. I decided that she didnt exist, that she had her chance and because she squandered her opportunity to be with me, a good guy, she deserved whatever she ended up with. I didnt answer her phone calls, didnt IM her anymore, deleted hundreds of emails (I had saved every one of them).

This policy worked pretty well, it protected my self esteem, and gave my anger a channel through which to express itself. If I was mad and righteously indignant about the situation, then there was less emotional real estate for the heartbreak and grief to take root in.

Then I met another, some six months later and this relationship took off and blossomed, we dated a year to the day and had expressed our love for each other. We were thinking about moving in together and all the serious relationship stuff that is a natural consequence of being in love. Then one day she took a new job and decided in a rather fatalistic way that since we would never see each other, she should end our relationship. Oh that hurt, bad. I was a mess, I tried to reason with her, asked her to reconsider, I begged and pleaded, but to no avail. Once again, she didn't exist, I went through my cathartic ritual again, burning her out of my soul the hard way. Denying her memory from having too much control of my psyche, burning the emails, the IM's, the tangible evidence of our year long affair. She called me about three months later, I had systematically ignored all previous attempt at communication but this time I was caught off guard. She tearfully said she had made a bad mistake, that her job fell through and she loved me and wanted me back. I thought that took a bit of nerve to have broken my heart only to come back after so much time had passed. I told her no, that we were done and to leave me alone.

More Scorched Earth, I never heard from her again.

I later lived to regret that one, I should have been more compromising. I really am a big softy and I do not like hurting others, still she hurt me, an eye for an eye anyone? In the chronology of this all, I eventually met yet another woman, asked this one to marry me and even moved in with her. That one fell through too, she ended it and in hindsight I am very glad she did but I was a total wreck for months. The scorched earth policy that had worked so well in the past did not quite cut it this time. Every time I tried to execute my ritual "purification by fire" mental gymnastics I found I felt just as bad. This round, only time would heal my heart, the anger while there,never took root like it did in the past. I found other ways to heal, for a good while after the break up I wanted her back, then one day I decided to keep walking. She occasionally hinted at a reconciliation, but as hard as it was, I held firm. If she hurt me that badly once she would do it again. We both moved on and months turned into years and then she had no power over me any longer. I can see her today, and feel nothing but a twinge of resentment, just a minor echo of a traumatic time in my life. I am free, and even though it took much longer I feel it was the healthier way to go. Scorched earth has it's downside, because anger takes too much energy and bad Karma can come from it. Lord knows I need all the good Karma I can get.

Enter BDJ, she found me online only a few months ago, and our meeting exploded into a full on relationship, instant best friends, and we fell in love in record time. Today we are grounded in love so sublime I have trouble expressing it. The point is, she is the one, and had I not walked through the fire of my last break up and took the time to understand and heal from the experience, had I not realized and owned my part of it, I would have been less prepared for the love of BDJ. The scorched earth policy was a shortcut, and it cheated me the thought process that is required to get healthy again. Heaven forbid anything should ever happen to this relationship that we cannot come to terms over. If it did happen in some hypothetical world, I would not hide in my angry shell, I would not go quietly into "she doesnt exist" mode. I would follow, I would work, I would still love her, and I would do anything to hold on. This is because after all the heartbreak, I still believe in love, and I am living the proof of it right now. I still believe that love can conquer all.

slf 10/15/06

Canned Cheese and Whiskey

2006-10-08T11:39:00.000-04:00

I have been fortunate enough in my life to have formed some very close and binding friendships. While I do not have hundreds of friends, maybe not even dozens, the ones I have are exceptionally dear to me. I am part of two groups of friends, one set from my highschool and college days and another set of more recent aquaintances culled from work, social interactions, and through other friends. The first set of friends and I share a history that spans some 25 years. These men and I stay in touch, travel across the country to see each other and generally keep up with each others lives. Alas, most of the group from years ago have moved away and made lives for themselves in diverse parts of the world, San Fransisco, Dallas, etc. Ironically I was the only one not from around this corner of the rural midwest, having arrived in "BFE Ohio" when I was 11 years old, yet I am the only one still here. One of these men, Chris, was gone from my life for nearly 10 years in the 80's and 90's, I was married, he had his own small business and we did not interact much. Then, suddenly in 2000 he called and said he was back in my little corner of Ohio, tucked into the cornfields, and we should get together.

The friendship from the old days blossomed anew and we became closer than ever. We spent a great deal of time together, playing guitar, discussing politics and history (he has a degree in history, I have years of watching the history channel and reading civil war books), we would go to bars together and be each others wing man. He was there for me when I went through a brutal break up with my finace. He held my hand and listened to me cry, he patiently let me express my anger, heartbreak and fear. He helped me to keep it together and made sure I made it home safely after drinking myself into oblivion in an effort to kill the pain.

I was there for him when he needed a break from the country life he was living on the family farm. I drove him where he needed to go since he doesnt drive. I was there for him as much as I could, and opportunity allowed. We are friends, the best kind of friends, like brothers. There is a quiet love between us, the kind that men have for each other and is usually subdued and runs like a deep river underground, not overt, but love nontheless.

Chris recently got a job as media support for an alternative news organization that concerns itself primarily with affairs in central and south America. Thus, last week, he got on a jet and left for Mexico, exact location undisclosed. I don't even know when I will hear from him again, let alone when he might be home. This sort of adventure is exactly what he likes to do, he loves the culture and people of the latin states, and has often travelled there. He speaks Spanish well and he will be fine, it is good for him.

At least in theory it is good for him, since journalists for this organization have been harrassed, beaten, detained, but fortunately never shot or made to vanish. I have had some concerns regarding the fact that the job could be dangerous, but I love him, so I support his decision, but I dont have to think it is a great idea. Mostly I am just unhappy becuase he is gone agian, I lost him once, and find myself generally unwilling to let him go.

We got together for a last visit one night not long ago, it was classic Phresh and Chris, just like old times. After some discussion on how we should spend the evening, we decided it would be a good idea to load up on snacks, like an adolescent slumber party. We came home with chips, crackers, canned cheese (I love ez cheeze), artichoke dip, pizza rolls, and plenty of ice. It so happened that I was nearly out of beer, and money, so the only intoxicating beverage in the house was a bottle of Kentucky burbon. No problem, I like burbon and coke, the night began. We laughed and talked and got stoned on whiskey. We played our guitars and listened to music till the early morning hours. The canned cheese was a big hit, and we happily munched on pizza rolls and chips all the while gamboling joyously in the warm glow of friendship. It was a good time and the last such time for the forseeable future.

Memory of this night will carry me till I see him again. He will get busy working and so will I, time will pass quickly, too quickly and one day we will both be older, but it will be like no time has passed at all, we will still be close friends as if he never went away. I am going to miss him, I miss him already, but if he survives the Mexican jungle and the dangerous assignments, he will be home someday. I hope he knows I am thinking about him.

Psyche Out

2006-10-06T21:26:00.000-04:00

It has been awhile since I entered a post on this blog, everyday I make a list of things to do and one of them is to write in my blog, however there are only so many hours in a day. It isnt as if I have a fan following, waiting with breathless anticipation for me to post a blog. So sue me.

As everyone knows by now I am involved in a fabulous relationship with a woman I love dearly. In 40 years I have not known this level of comfort, joy, love, and security, even when I was married it didnt feel this right. There may be many reasons for this, age and experience can teach us what we want, what we are looking for and when we find it we know. Perhaps I just took four decades to find the woman of my dreams. There is also the possibility of needing maturity to be the right man for the right woman, regardless, today I am the luckiest man alive.

Still, occasionally my heart gets scared, once in awhile I still wonder if it is all too good to be true, if only for a moment. I know better intellectually, my mind knows what she said, my brain remembers the long talks in the night, the vows of love forever and the oaths of fealty. I know she loves me and I know we are in this for the long haul, and I am confident we will be together, in love forever. Yes we have both used the term forever, and guess what? I am very comfortable with that.

My history with relationships however has been a harrowing one, and my heart may be excused for looking over it's shoulder sometimes. One day last week, I was in the office working and expected to hear from my girl, she always emails, or calls, and in some way lets me know she is thinking about me. It was gloomy outside and I was very tired, and at noon I had not yet heard from her. This isnt even that unusual since she has an important and busy job and cannot always take time out for a quick email. Intellectually, I know this and all is well. Yet as the day progressed I began to feel melencholy, sort of down for no apparent reason. I stopped to ask myself why. I decided it was the weather, and the weariness and let it go at that.

Then out of nowhere, I asked myself a question. What if there were something wrong? What if she and I had been having a disagreement about something? (we werent) What if she wanted to end the relationship? Remember, I knew better, I just decided to ask these questions hypothetically to see where it went in my head. The mental gymnastics started then, and this sort of masochistic gut check went awry. Someday we will have a fight, some day one of us will be hurt and maybe have temporary dark thoughts about our future together. I guess I was just trying to for see what that day might feel like.

I did not like the feeling, and the thought occured to me in all its stark horror that I would have a very hard time without her. Without this amazing person in my life I would be miserable, sad, and I really do not want to find out how I would get through such a thing. Yes I have done it before and I would survive, but how long would this one hurt should it ever come to that? We take the risks becuase the rewards are worth it, she is worth it and there is only one way to find out if we are right for each other and that is to put our hearts on the line and see what happens. I took that plunge a long time ago and I have no reason to regret it. We really are as compatible and in love as any two people can be.

Later that day as she lay in my arms and we talked about the days events, I opened up and shared the experience. It was a little hard to communicate that fact that none of it was real, just a mind game that I wish I hadnt played. She was wonderful, and understanding and most importantly assured me all was well. Just like I knew it was all along.

My wary heart trusts her more everyday, and my love for her grows with it. I am happy that I do not have to contemplate strife in our relationship today. The most important lesson is knowing and trusting, that when there is a problem we respond to each other in loving and understanding terms, if we do that there will never be a problem we cannot solve. I know we can do that, and I am glad.

slf.

Love Songs

2006-09-18T21:54:00.000-04:00

I like music, some would say I am obsessive about it. I like all kinds of music too, rock and roll, blues, vintage country, jazz, new age, the list goes on. I own 600 compact disks and almost 10,000 MP3’s so one would think my collection well represents every genre and type of music there is. I also play guitar, just rhythm mind you, and some flat picking, a sprinkling of finger picking, but no blazing lead crescendos. I have a repertoire of a few dozen songs I can sing and play, adequately at least. I even managed to play in a band not long ago.

I very much enjoy playing my guitar and recently I have had the opportunity to serenade a special lady, my girlfriend, she smiles when I play my songs, she doesn’t criticize my left hand technique or my time keeping ability, she just tells me how good I am and of course I just humbly state that I can’t carry a tune in a bucket nor play the guitar well but I try. Still I love to play and sing for her, I am starting to get a “best of” list of tunes she enjoys hearing.

Most of what I play is of the roots rock variety, and some folk tunes. It occurs to me that nearly every song I know is sad. I recently learned a song from my collection by the Marshall Tucker Band, it is a classic rock staple, with easy chords, opportunities for emotive vocals and some cool walk downs. I couldn’t wait to try it out on her last weekend. I started out with the finger picking at the beginning and then launched into the chorus with some verve. I wasn’t missing my chord changes much, and I had the lyrics in front of me when I realized this song was about a man that had been jilted by his lover and he wanted to “find a hole to crawl into” and “take a freight train to Georgia and never come back”. This is not a love song, and being just the opposite of a love song means it probably isn’t the best thing to serenade my lover with.

This problem extends to my massive music collection as well, oh sure with tens of thousands of songs to choose from, I should have hundreds of love songs to listen to, at a minimum. However I do not, I have trouble finding a good love song in my collection. See, when we are apart I want to listen to something that will remind me of her, I wish to hear a good tune with lyrics about happy love, and blissful nights in each others arms, or winsome expressions of longing and desire. Instead I have a giant collection of songs that when the subject is love, are morbidly concerned with broken hearts, cheating lovers, unrequited love and loss.

I understand that I never noticed because all those negative things comprise what my experience has been for the most part up till now. My head just isn’t there any longer. Even the drinking songs sound hollow today, because I am not lonely, I don’t drink to kill any pain, I am not spending nights alone.

For most of my life I have regarded love songs as smarmy, sweet and a bit self indulgent. They lacked realism, in my world love always ended in some bad heartbreak or at best ended in apathy and nothingness. In my world, love usually meant I was going to get hurt, and spend a lot of time drinking and listening to music about some pathetic character in the same mental hell I was in.

So as I embark on this new relationship, as I have surrendered my heart to this remarkable woman, I seek love songs, and I will find them. The new soundtrack to my life will be a happier one, and I will save the other stuff for the audiences that want to hear it, there are plenty of them out there, but today I am not one of them.

Killing Time

2006-09-01T23:30:00.000-04:00

“Men talk of killing time, while time quietly kills them.”

Dion Boucicault

I am almost 40 years old, and I have had an interesting first half of life by some standards, dull by others. I wonder what might have changed if I had to do it all over again. Of course I will not be given the opportunity to do it again; the second chances in life are always for the future, not the past. Today on the cusp of midlife, I feel as though time is slipping by, and I do not mean in the garden variety cliché sort of way. I mean it is going at warp speed and it is fucking with my head.

The last few years have seen a ratcheting up of the speed of time, or rather, my personal perception of time. The clock doesn’t run any faster, nor do the seasons come any other time than that prescribed by God and nature. The world on which I live is spinning the same orbits it has since creation first dawned in the void. Yet I feel as though the very foundations upon which my personal history rests are sliding, with increasing speed into space, never to be recovered.

It is almost as if the accumulated weight of the past is pushing the present against an implacable future. Tomorrow will come when it comes, it cannot be moved, and thus the present is compressed. This compression is the source of my concern, my near panic over the perception that time will continue to speed up till one day I awake an old man, wondering where my life went, evaporated in the heat of living.

“Time is the school in which we learn, time is the fire in which we burn.”
Delmore Schwartz

Time has become my enemy; it steals from me every moment that passes into the past, puts more pressure on the present. How do I make it slow down? How do I make it feel more like it did ten years ago, or 25 years ago? When days seems to last forever, it seemed there was time enough to waste, time enough to accomplish everything that needed to be done, time enough to forge a good life. I asked a friend of mine with a bit more maturity resting on her shoulders than I, she said the only way to slow it down was to retire to the grave. Then time will have robbed the very breath from my lungs and time as I have known it will cease to exist. Then eternity awaits, and time will no longer matter.

The phenomenon appears to be a common thread among all people. I have canvassed men and women my age, younger people and older people as well. Everyone seems to sense the same thing with one notable difference. That it didn’t seem alarming to them, certainly not this feeling I have that time is rushing at break neck speed only that it was speeding up.

In an attempt to put this disconcerting feeling into perspective, I have given it much thought. The conclusions that I have come to are ethereal, and subtle, not concrete enough to be a law of nature. The first reason is that the accumulated experience of living changes what we expect of the present and the future. As children we do not understand the concept of tomorrow very well. Life is lived at the moment. When we mature we begin to realize that tomorrow does come and there are reactions and consequences as a result of how we lived in the past. As adults we also become very busy living, earning a paycheck, taking care of our children, and the thousands of mundane issues that crowed our modern lives.

Another poignant thought that occurred to me as I meditated on the problem, is that at midlife I have perspective, I have a history to review and years upon which to judge my current status.

Perhaps it is the feeling that I am dissatisfied by what I have accomplished in 40 years, mayhap I feel as though I am not where I had thought I would be on life’s path and there is now precious little time left to make it right. This realization is most likely the source of the problem, not only is there less time to do things, but there is more momentum behind.

Time and tide wait for no man. A pompous and self-satisfied proverb, and was true for a billion years; but in our day of electric wires and water-ballast we turn it around: Man waits not for time nor tide. ~Mark Twain

There is another factor that interests me regarding time. I work with computers, and computers take up most of my day. I sit in front of a computer for many hours, earning a living. When the time comes to play I use the computer, when communications are needed I once again use the computer. In the not so distant past, a trip to a city 40 miles away might have taken all day. Now we can be there in under an hour. Imagine needing to meet with someone in another city in order to transact business, without a telephone, a computer, or a car. There would be letters, and then an odyssey on horseback to make it happen. I am coming to believe that these machines are partly to blame. I can stick my head in my work and whole days rocket into the past as if they didn’t happen at all. We have the world at our fingertips, we have communications at the speed of light, and we have instant gratification in the online world. In my lifetime there have always been phones and cars and airplanes. I wonder if others felt the same way when the world of horseback and telegraphs and the pony express was replaced with rocket ships, jet airplanes and fast cars with good roads upon which to speed. A different kind of revolution occurred in my life, the computer revolution. Just in the past decade or so we find the ability to call someone from anywhere to anywhere with a cell phone, the ability to send documents at the speed of light anywhere on the globe and instantaneous access to a seeming endless stream of information on demand.

What ever the reasons for the feeling that time gets faster and faster, I suppose the only antidote short of death is to use time wisely, and to use it in a way that promotes a goal. The machines are not going away, and time will continue to slip by with no resistance, no stops to make it slow. I wonder what revolution will happen in my children’s time, what new modern contrivance will make the time in their lives speed up to dizzying speeds? Whatever it may be, it is sure to affect me as well, unless I am beyond time by then, sleeping in a place where time is meaningless and the only deadline ahead of me becomes the day I am finally returned to the dust from which I came. Or another day in eternity and deadlines are just that, dead.

Scott L Freshour 11-21-05

Suite Judy Blue Eyes is Still Seven Minutes Too Long.

2006-08-31T12:02:00.000-04:00

Suite Judy Blue Eyes is Still 7 Minutes Too Long.

Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Gemain Amphitheatre Columbus Ohio, August 29^th 2006

Last night was a lot of fun, yes you heard me right, last night in the year of our lord 2006. However if you ignored the attire and the lack of cannabis smoke in the air, if you were seated too far away to see the age on the band members faces, if you didn’t look at the Jumbotron, it could have been 1970. There were peace signs and long hair, there were the sounds of CSN&Y singing a protest song. The funny thing was, the song was written 35 years ago about a different war, and a different time.

I am a fan of CSN&Y they have been a part of my personal soundtrack for many years, classics like “Ohio” and “Helplessly Hoping” songs that have been a staple on Album Oriented Radio since the songs were new. I am 40 years old, and by the time I became familiar with this music it was already many years past being relevant. As a rebellious teen in the 80’s I was listening to music that was considered “classic”. In 1982 the power and message of the music was just a reverberation, an echo of events long ago.

I remember the seduction of the 60’s era however, I remember wishing I had something to protest, to feel rebellious about, something to feel strongly and righteously against. I remember as a young man listening to music already 20 years in the can, imagining what it must have been like. When young people spoke out and made a change in the world, when it was ok to smoke weed and participate in free love. When these people, empowered, helped end a war and brought down a president all in the name of truth, justice and the American way.

Those kids are now in their 40’s and driving BMW’s and Lexus sedans, they are rich, successful and aging gracefully. Life has been good to them, life in America.

The band can still sing, and play their folksy style of guitar very well. They can still harmonize with the best of them and I liked hearing the music. The crowd was pretty evenly divided between young and older. The lawn was covered with kids in their 20’s with peace signs and tie dye, I wonder why they didn’t invent their own symbols of rebellion and social conscience, why are they recycling the 60’s?

The band played many new songs, all war protest songs or songs that derided the government, or defamed our president. The music was good, inspired and technically on the money. The boys of CSN&Y are professional musicians after all and know what they are doing. I simply couldn’t help but be struck by the hollowness of the message. This is not 1969 when they played the Woodstock Music and Art festival on Yasgurs farm. This is not 1970 when four students died at the hands of government troops inspiring the classic hit “Ohio”. This is not even 1974 when Richard Nixon resigned in disgrace after Watergate and the disasterous end of the Vietnam war. This is 2006 and George Bush 43 is in charge. There has been no Woodward and Bernstein to uncover a lie, there have been no shootings in the streets by the national guard, it is a different time altogether. And the innocence has ended, it ended a long time ago.

The message of CSN&Y was all about how our president is a crook (sound familiar) and about how our government lied to us (again sounds familiar doesn’t it?) and how the war is awful and we should get out right now. The thing is, I would bet out of 2600 young men that tragically lost their lives serving our nation, no one in that crowd knew one. In Vietnam there were 50,000 casualties, body bags on the news every night, and almost everyone knew somebody affected by the war. The entire thing is just recycled, and hollow. It is ok to protest the war in Iraq, it is even ok to disagree with presidential policy, but the vitriol has no sting today. It has all been done before.

Slf

Perspective

2006-08-31T10:03:00.000-04:00

I am sitting by the window this morning, staring at the morning gloom, low clouds threatening rain. My mind is in rewind, replaying last night, last week, last month. A cup of coffee steams in my hand as I reflect, traffic bustles by below my second story window oblivious to my presence. Alone in my room, quiet and still, I have a heart full of feelings this morning some I am trying to identify, some I have an intimacy with. I am in love, stricken, blown away, my heart is bound to a woman I didn’t think I would ever meet. She consumes my thoughts and my mind has trouble focusing on the more mundane. Work? I ask mutely. I will try, but the early morning weather and a wondering mind have colluded to make me wistful. I feel very close to her today, we left each others embrace only a few hours ago, still one feeling is longing, I miss her already. I think I could spend every moment with her and be happy, not cramped, not chained, not clinging, but joyous in her presence, content in the warm glow of her love.

My current state of singularity is only a temporary condition, I will see her again very soon and I find myself counting the moments, while the echo’s of the last kiss still reverberate on my lips and her scent is still on my clothes and she is very much on my mind, almost here, but not quite.

Our love is new, a bright shiny thing that sparks and crests and swallows me up everyday. It is growing too, and there is nothing I wish to do more than nurture it, help it become strong with deep roots and mighty boughs. When she tells me she loves me I believe her, I get a small chill down my spine, like hearing those words after all that has gone before is like water in a desert, a pardon for a condemned man, a light in the darkness. I find myself hoping, even praying that this never ends, that the love we feel for each other continues, like in days of old, when people actually paired for life, when to love someone meant you loved them forever.

The clouds seem to have lifted some outside my window, a brightening of the sky, perhaps the day will break high and fine after all. I realize that she hopes for the same things I do, that in time we are still in love, a couple, committed, happy. I begin to believe that it will happen, and even though my convictions have misled me in the past, this is different. This time fate has intervened, this time the odds are in our favor. That is the ideal I cherish, and I do not have second thoughts about my path. I love her plain and simple.

Being alone is over rated, I can do it successfully and have for a long time, but since she has been in my life, so short a time, I now know what I have been missing. I have missed this most powerful of feelings, I have missed tenderness, I have missed caring, and I have missed beauty. She is beautiful, the prettiest woman I have ever known, and that goes far beyond her lovely exterior, it extends down to her kind and generous heart, her endearing soul. Where has she been all my life? She is wise too, and makes good points often, like what if we had met each other before now? What if we had met 15 years ago when we were younger and starting our adult lives, what heartache would we have avoided? What pain might not have entered our lives? We concluded that now was the exact right moment and I agree with that. Today is the perfect time to fall in love and stay there, today is the best of times, the greatest of times, today is when I want to be alive and healthy and loving her with all my heart.

Tomorrow is only a few short hours away, and the next kiss will contain all my hope, desire and love, it will encompass everything I feel, that is what makes every kiss special. I know I sound hopeless, and maybe foolish, but I do not care. What I know is she is every one I have ever looked for, she may well be the elusive soul mate that everyone talks about but I have never met. I am very much looking forward to finding out.

Slf 08-06

Blogging and other things

2006-08-28T16:22:00.000-04:00

I am sort of new to blogging, but not really. See, I have been writing stuff and posting it to the internet for many years, usually privately and usually not seen by many other people. I have started this blog with some older writings that I thought were pretty good. I mostly write when I am in love or heart broken, today I am in love.
Occasionally, I write satire, or just a good essay on some subject that interests me. I think I will start publishing all this random drivel on here, for all of you to see, to critique and to maybe enjoy.

Throughout the older writings one gets the sense that there has been some emotional upheaval, this is true, as one of my most productive writing episodes were the two years after my divorce. I was one heart broken dude back then. Time moves on of course and much has happened since then. A recurring theme in some of the older writing is a longing for someone to love. I no longer need to love somebody, I have healed and become much more healthy regarding such things. My heart has been battered around some in the intervening years but finally I learned that I am ok by myself and I function just fine without being in love with a woman, without being in a relationship, that I am a good person and need not define my success as a man by the love of another.

Still one gets lonesome, and the memory of love still brings a smile in most cases. I dated around quite alot, being selective and enjoying this new found power, this knowledge that I did not have a burning sense of need to be in a relationship at all, so I could afford to be picky.

Not long ago I met someone that has rocked my world, flat out took me by suprise and exploded into my life. I felt like I had known her for years, that we were instant best friends. She takes my breath away, and yes, I love her. Incredible but true, and there is no denying the fact. I smile at the thought of her, and long for her touch when we are apart, I count the moments till we meet again. I worry that something will go wrong, it is all better when next we speak. Yes, the symptoms are all there and I for one am looking forward to a long and happy relationship this time. It is early, but I give this one better than average odds of success. I am old enough to recognize differences, and she is different, the way this feels is different and life is way to short to not take a risk or two.

So as this thing we call a blog evolves into an ongoing project, there will be many posts regarding this remarkable woman that owns my heart. She is amazing and is the spark that awakened my dozing muse.
Enjoy (slf)

Musings and email snippets from 2002

2006-08-28T16:05:00.000-04:00

The following four snippets of writing were found while cleaning out some email archives. The context is somewhat vague, as I do not even remember exactly what was going on during this time. I post them here becuase they are not bad, interesting to read and are an insight into feelings years ago.
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....A moment in time. Brought on by a circumstance .. a melody..a scent of perfume. A state of un-resolved longing. A vacuum. A vague sense of loss. Then a second feeling. One even more subtle. A nebulous feeling of want. A directionless projection of love, of care of tenderness. No target in sight. To whom are these feelings meant. Who do they belong to. All just random scatterings of emotion. Flung hither and thither about the universe. It will take a woman to coalesce and focus these feelings. Most times a man can forget them and do man things. Other times, if he is honest, times like these leave a great empty hole in his psyche. Repaired only with time and forgetfulness. Or filled with the love he seeks. When will that time come. Where is she tonight? He carries in him a great hope that tomorrow will bring her into his life. That each new dawn is a promise of things to come and a renewal of hope for the future. A string of disappointments not withstanding he thinks enough of himself still to believe in the ultimate dream. That love is forever after all and people do give it unconditionally to each other. The clock ticks and time may change him but he can't change time. Youth, at the end of the day is wasted on the inexperienced and the immature. There is an equal out there who does not care about his mortality but the promise of today. At the mid point of his short stay on this globe he thinks he has quite a lot to share and that eventually the quest will be over and he will love again. And be loved. What more can he ask for....

....the weekend. Sunday mornings alone aren't so bad he thought. I can take my time, have some coffee, read the paper. The silence was deafening. He put on some music. The dulcet tones of some female chanteuse hovered in the air. Like the dust motes illuminated by the morning sun. Floating, hanging, with no direction except where the draft takes them. In moments of reflection like these he seldom thinks about past loves. Has blocked out the pain of separation, finally. At first with the help of vodka and juice, closing down the local pub, lamenting to anyone who would listen. Then as time passed he dealt with his emotions in a less destructive way. The memories could still sting, but had lost their power over him. A sense of ambivalence. What seemed to fill his mind now in moments of quiet, were visions of the dream woman. He once read that lonely people do strange things. He believed it.

The mid morning sunshine gave way to a thickening blanket of clouds. Rain or snow was on its way. A dry documentary on the mating habits of some fish was on the television. 120 channels and nothing on TV. He drifted off to sleep somewhere between the fish and an info-mercial proclaiming the benefits of an abdominal exercise machine. Sleet had started to pelt the windows. Dozing in the lazy afternoon. Wandering thoughts. There she is. The gossamer dream woman. Hair ablaze, eyes bright, sultry in her robes, more like clouds of sheer satin. Dream clothes. She comes close like before, arms outstretched, filled with need and promise. The knot forms in his belly. All the same except he hasn't awakened yet. The embrace was enough to knock the breath from his lungs. Not hard but electric, like a shot of voltage through his body. He was aroused. He finds himself looking face to face with the nameless apparition. Staring into deep cloudy eyes, holding her face close to his. He can feel the heat of her neck and the tickle of a lock of hair fallen around his hand. So close, a stream of communication flows between his eyes and hers. Her lips pout to accept his kiss and the moment draws near. A sharp intake of breath. Eyes closed in anticipation of the touch of her lips on his. A ringing in his ears...ringing...bells...

The phone had managed to wake him after all. A groggy hello and it was all over. Some telemarketer wanting him to switch long distance service. He lit a cigarette and sighed. Some day. He would meet her in real life, and he would disconnect the phone.....

....I sit and stare at the phosphorus glow of the monitor. Illuminating its territory of desk top. Blackness seeps in from around it's edges. It is so cold and impersonal, doesn't care about the feelings and warmth inside me. Just executes the instructions given it without question. Sits mute despite the emotion of the user. No amount of want or need can make it respond. Just input from the clacking keyboard makes it do anything. Cold. Bits and bytes. Still, my touch is evident in every keystroke. My desire is transmitted in every action. My eyes have seen every word. Perhaps when you see these words on yet another cold piece of cold silicon. You will be warmed by the intent, the desire, the promise...Can you feel me tonight? Can you grasp the emotion? Flying through space at the speed of light? I am here with you in my mind. Connected by miles of copper wire. I can touch you yet. If not in real life then in cyberspace. I pray that touch is warm, undiluted by distance. I am thinking of you. Here in my world. I wish you were here....

.....He felt as though his wildest dreams had finally come true. The passion shared the night before reverberated in his mind. In his soul. Every fiber of his being begged for her touch. Reaching out with want and need. Searching for the warmth that necessity had deprived him. The static left from a night of love was enough to light his life. Ignite his hope, fire his dreams. He looked across the gulf between them. How long till a repeat performance. Could they keep the fire alive? He decided then and there that he would project in every thought and movement his desire for her. His need for her, his want. When he closed his eyes he saw her face, the deep stare, the enigmatic suggestion of lust...Enough to fuel his dreams forever. Now the thought of leaving dreams for reality piqued his imagination. So in a few days they would be together again ,but a few days seemed like an eternity..He would have to wait. Wait he would and the reward would be estacy.....

First Tree (December 2001)

2006-08-28T15:59:00.000-04:00

There was a tree green and gold. Faded by time and space. It sat in the corner by the window. The blinds were open so the passers by could see it. Gaily festooned with glitter and tinsel. There was an ornament hanging there. It said "babies first Christmas" with the name "Scotty" etched into a space in crooked marker ink. The first tree in my life was so long ago I no longer remember it in any sure way. I remember a house full of love and a mother who fussed over her little son. Of shiny glass bulbs and twinkling lights. A mound of wrapped packages under its dark boughs. Perhaps I reached for my mothers smiling face, attracted by the flashing lights reflected in her glasses. Perhaps.

Then there was the first tree I shared with my new wife. The woman I loved and hoped to spend forever with. Young and full of hope. The first tree was a shared experience. No little ones yet to share the joy. Just two lovers. Dragging home a tree that cost a weeks worth of groceries.Decorated in the best fashion possible. It represented a time when the future held so much promise. The tree will be better next year. And it was. Making sweet love under its gleaming limbs. Thinking no decoration could possibly be as lovely as the woman gently sighing under me. Soft white light the only illumination. It didn't matter there was no money to buy gifts. What mattered was each other. Singular, enraptured, in love.

Now there is another first tree. A tree that is the first on my own. No wife to share it with, no lover to consummate under its gleaming bulk. It is pretty, decorated in ribbon and lace. It just seems hollow. Like there is a portion not present. As if a Christmas tree needs a family to make it whole. The children marvel at its beauty still. Unknowing of grown up emotions or wants, or past mistakes. That.. provides hope, to see the joy in a Childs eyes over the magic of a Christmas tree. Just how much magic does it contain? What miracle can a dead piece of pine produce? It has brought memories and a feeling of regret and loss. Also a hope for the future. A light in the dark of winter.

Just another first tree. There will be more. The one thing that has continued unchanged is the tree itself. Every year at the solstice humans erect a tree. Despite lost love, death, and a host of other doom. The people feel compelled to decorate a tree. Then stand in it's glow and marvel at the lovely thing it has become. Let the memories come they aren't all bad, in fact most of the time it was good. Another first tree can make me smile after all....

Everyone out of the gene pool (Humor from June 2002)

2006-08-28T10:50:00.000-04:00

The ex has recently informed me there will be a family reunion for her side of the family in the coming weeks. She wants to know if the girls can go. Naturally, I have no problem with my daughters mingling with their ancestry. Although I should. My family has dispersed and I have never fit in very well anyway. I do remember family reunions Appalachian style. It is high summer. We converge on the shelter house at the rest area on the little highway. The picnic tables are pushed together and uncle Dick has been there since the crack of dawn to reserve our place at said shelter house. Within an hour the tables are covered with succulent mystery dishes covered in a secretive veil of tin foil. There are piles of napkins and plastic cups, coolers full of beverages, big jugs of sweet tea and lemonade. Everyone has a lit cigarette. There is a Frisbee in the air and some of the lesser known female cousins have been eyed up by the boys. A euchre game is underway in a corner of the shelter house. Finally the call for dinner is shouted out and children run from all over the park to partake of the bounty presented in honor of ancestry. A furious rustle of tin foil and plastic wrap and like magic the Tupperware becomes grand chargers laden with the fruits of good country kitchens. The fat aunts can really cook. There is ham and then more ham, great tubs of cheese cut into chunks, Buns and hamburgers, all the fixings too. There are seeming miles of casseroles laid end on end like barges, all of which conceal the inside ingredients with thick scabs of melted cheese. Oh and the desserts. Cakes and pies. I hear someone yell at the top of their lungs."where's the ambrosia at" A query quickly stifled when the wonderful jello and marshmallow concoction comes out. One version has pasticcios in it. Hillbilly cooks shouldn't get too creative.
A line quickly forms up around the serving tables. Mothers and older children helping the youngsters. A new cousin cries somewhere in the heap of family and food. The cackling aunts blather on about family connections and how great aunt "Einie" will be 94 this summer. Mostly the noise level evens out as fifty hungry relatives consume vast amounts of cured pork and carbohydrates.
Finally as a last gasp of consumption takes place, folks start to drift about. The afore mentioned lesser known female cousins take off and a similar group of boys tag along to get chummy and perhaps see a gap in a halter top. There is something fundamentally wrong with this behavior but I did it too. Hey where we come from you can legally marry your cousin. Meanwhile back in the cool recesses of the shelter house several euchre games fire up. Everyone has iced tea and the ashtrays are getting full. Eventually this orgy of familiarity comes to a close and the fat aunts pick up the Tupperware and the big green barrels chained to strategic points fill with the detritus of feasting.
I look back and wonder if I really came from these people. I know I did and part of me cant complain. I have lost much because of death and alienation. Have I as a misfit simply turned my back on my heritage? Am I really so arrogant as to eschew my lineage as a fluke of nature. ...
Ok I can live with that.