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August 31, 2007
Friday Night Dinner
Friday night, August 31, Lady Penelope had guests over for dinner. I learned one new thing that night and reintroduced myself to something I already knew about me.
The New Thing I Learned: Brits eat with knives and forks. Probably spoons as well but, generally speaking, there is always a knife and fork working at the same time during a meal. Lady P had tried to point out the correct way of eating earlier in the week — I'd noticed she'd kept her fingers out of her food when it came time to push the last bits around on the plate and toward the fork and had commented on it; that's when she explained the upside-down-fork-and-knife method to me.
I tried it once but didn't care for the fact that it kept me from the type of serious food-scooping I prefer. And then I thought nothing more of it.
Until dinner Friday night, that is.
One of the guys, and we'll call him Timothy Dalton as that's who I thought he resembled and I hesitate to use the real names of people (though it began with a "J," should anybody be reading who thinks I forgot due to something that happened later)… Timothy asked if all Americans ate with only a fork. He asked just after I'd lopped a big chunk off a two-inch thick steak using only a fork (and a plastic one at that) and I thought he might be interested in hearing about my technique.
Well, maybe that's not exactly what happened. He asked just after I had sliced off a piece of some of the best chicken I'd ever eaten. Chicken that tasted so good that it made a person feel bad that a chicken of such flavor, juiciness, and savoir-faire had been killed and served in a delicate sauce of some sort with vegetables and other items that have been erased from my memory due to something that happened later in the evening.
Anyway, just after Timothy asked about my fork use I looked up and noticed everybody else was using the upside-down-fork-and-knife technique. Had I not known better I would have thought I was dining with the British Synchronized Eating Team (I would have given them an 8 for presentation and a 9 for technique. The 5 they would have received for degree of difficulty would have been due to the lack of challenge offered by the tenderness and succulentness of the main course as something as simple as a hard stare would have been enough to separate meat from bone.)
The British easting style is all very civilized. (And it makes me wonder, even more, about all the guys I'd see on the street with their shirts untucked.)
The Thing I Already Knew: I drink everything at the same speed and I drink a lot of it. I have a 2.2 liter bottle (this one) on my desk and will fill it twice during my day at work (no, I'm not diabetic). Knowing this about myself, deciding to forgo beer (at about 4-6% alcohol by volume) for red wine (which averages 12-14%) may have been a bad idea.
This, unsurprisingly, caught up with me by the end of the night and bits and pieces of the evening (toward the end, just about the time the Backgammon board came out) are lost forever.
Forever, that is, except for the video Lady Penelope thought she'd make.
[The boys and I had dinner out tonight and I told them the story about the forks and knives. Jack wondered if the British ever used spoons and then went so far as to pick up his knife and spoon and ask, with his spoon upside down, "Do they eat their soup like this?" You gotta love the boy's sense of humor.]
This is a picture of me that I don't remember being taken. I've cropped out the other poor soul (his name begins with an "I").
[For the record: I do remember this picture being taken but I had a theme going (and it is that last thing I remember… that didn't involve snoring). Also, I was torn between presenting facts — I had a very nice dinner with a group of wonderful people Friday night, I helped make dessert, the food was excellent and I had a great time — and being me. I, uh, went with being me. Sammy Davis Jr. wouldn't have wanted it any other way.]
Hey, before I go… I've got a pocket full of those big, round, copper colored coins with the Queen's picture on them. It's the coin where she's throwing out that sassy stare and you catch just a bit of clevage. Lady P, they're all yours for the video. The other poor sould might throw in a quid or two as well.
Posted by delmer at 3:04 PM | Comments (6)
August 30, 2007
Windsor Castle
As you are all well aware, I'm writing this from the future (September 6 to be exact — I'm already home) and backposting.
I believe that on Thursday August 30th we went to Windsor Castle, in Windsor. (I had a bit of trouble on Friday August 31st that affected my memory some.)
[Correction: On Thursday we went shoppin' (and had butter scones for tea…), ahem, on Thursday we shopped for school uniforms. It was Friday that we went to Windsor; the part about something else happening Friday that affected my memory holds true.]
The Queen was not in that day as denoted by the fact that the Royal Standard was absent and the Union Jack was flying in its place. Still, I got some very nice photos.
Several shots of Windsor Castle immediately follow (the place is huge — you'll get just bits and pieces):
This is a house of some sort with a severe lean.
Once a week Queen Victoria is disinterred and placed on a pedestal in the center of the village.
The castle's rumpus room is being remodeled. This is the drywall delivery.
Prince Charles and Camilla were married here.
This was, at one time, the train station. It is now shops.
Windsor Village.
I imagine this is a shop full of Old Women. It's right next to Moe'z (which I suspect is spelled with a 'Z' to keep Matt Groening's attorneys away.)
Posted by delmer at 1:58 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
August 29, 2007
British Signage
These are some of the various signs I've seen in England.
Ice would appear to freeze at 45 degrees F in England. (7.2C), as I've had no beer that has approached ice cold.
It took me a minute to sort out that this was for some kind of body spray. You'll notice at the bottom it says Wanted: Filthy Boys.
I loved this sign. It seems to say, If he's in the mood and possibly having a bad day, the Alcohol Control Officer may, though he may not, ticket you…
I've seen several "Slow Down Now" signs but, naturally, failed to have a non-blurry shot of one; we slow down so violently when we see one of the signs it is hard for the auto-focus to keep up. Maybe that isn't true. The "Slow Down Now" signs seem to scream "Slow Down Now! Goddammit!." They struck me as funny, especially after seeing the Alcohol Control Area sign.
Our version of "Yield." There is a sign this same shape that has nothing in it except a Big Exclamation Point. When I asked Lady Penelope what it meant she said, "Keep your wits about you. Almost anything can happen." We could use some of those in the states.
I'm pretty sure that Bagshot is their equivalent of The Nutter Center.
Posted by delmer at 6:42 AM | Comments (5)
August 28, 2007
Breakfast Correction
In the photos from earlier today I identified the shot of breakfast as having been a meal prepared by Lady Penelope's mother. Even as I marveled at the fact that I had not remembered Lady P's Parent's table looking so much like Lady P's dining room table, I never made the jump that maybe the table in question was, in fact, the one in Lady P's home… a table I'd eaten at more than once or twice.
Lady Penelope was kind enough to (politely) point out my mistake.
I thought, perhaps, I should share the correction with you as it might help ensure future breakfasts.
Lady P thought, perhaps, mowing the yard might go a bit further toward ensuring future breaksfasts. Notice I'm mowing from the left-hand side.
Posted by delmer at 4:06 PM | Comments (5)
London, England -- Sunday
Sunday (August 26) I was treated to Lady P's Father's Patented Guided Tour of London.
I had a great time and can't begin to express how much I appreciate Lady Penelope's parents taking the time to show me around. They are genuinely wonderful people.
Following the tour we returned Chez Lady Penelope's Parent's for dinner (slow-cooked lamb casserole). I believe Lady P's mother fed me three times; based on my experience I'd have to say she's exactly as good a cook as my mother, only British.
Some of the things we saw on the tour follow (and I'm just a bit surprised I don't have any photos of food). Most of the photos resize when double-clicked:
The Thames
The Globe Theater
The Anchor Pub. We had a couple of beers here and I knew not to tip.
Tower of London
I knew it was unlike me not to have a picture of breakfast! This is Sunday-morning breakfast at Lady Penelope's Parent's. Eggs, hash browns, baked beans, sausage and bacon. Sweet!
Posted by delmer at 10:31 AM | Comments (1)
August 27, 2007
London and the Hooligans
Saturday morning (the 25th of August) I arrived at Gatwick in London. Lady P picked me up and whisked me to Micky D's, then Crowthorne. Following a brief rest we zipped back to London for dinner with her parents which would be followed by seeing Spamalot at the theater.
After Spamalot we went to a pub and ordered a couple of beers. (I would have said "ordered a couple of pints" but I don't want to appear to be putting on airs or getting all Alex Trebek on you).
Two beers came to, what? Probably eight dollars which would suggest a tip of about two dollars.
British money was still very new to me at this point (and I want to pause here to mention just how impressed I am that their ATMs are able to spit out bills of differing sizes and colors). When I went to tip I pulled out a pocketful of change and dug out a pound piece (roughly two bucks). The problem with tipping a pound coin is that it looks so much like a quarter that it's hard to feel good about leaving it.
The bartender seemed happy enough to get it though and gave me a friendly little wave. (Lady P was pretty sure he was flirting with me.)
As we walked away from the bar — to take our drinks outside to drink on the sidewalk and watch people (just the basic outside… not a special part of the outside that was fenced off and part of the bar) — hmm, as I was saying, as we walked away from the bar area Lady P explained that Brits don't tip in bars and restaurants; wait staff is paid a far better wage than they are in the USA.
(It should be noted that any time I approached the bar after that I was served immediately. I consistently left a pound behind to show my appreciation.)
So, there we were. In London. Standing on the sidewalk drinking beer and watching people.
Whoa, I almost forgot. I'd been giving Lady Penelope a hard time about the Brits drinking warm beer and she was eager for me to see that it was a myth. In order to help her with her myth busting I'd ordered something that had "super cold" stamped right on the tap.
So, there we were. In London. Standing on the sidewalk drinking beer and watching people. Lady P took a sip of her beer and made a face. "How's your beer?" she asked.
"Not super cold," I said.
"It is not always this warm," she told me.
I took a sip of her beer and it was warm. Very warm. My beer was, in all honesty, adequately cold and we figured it lacked super coldness due to the amount of beer that was probably being pumped on a Saturday night. (Still, I thought it was pretty funny that Penelope had been given a warm beer when I'd been razzing her about the Brit's warm-beer-drinking habits for a while before my trip.)
Drinking beer. Watching people. The buzz of the street. I was all very cool.
"You f*cking c**t," someone screamed, catching my attention. It was a woman who had just come from around the corner. She was screaming at someone up the street and out of our view as we were standing on the side of the building away from the main street.
The Brits are certainly more comfortable with c**t than Americans are, I thought (I'd seen it in Hot Fuzz, and a Usenet group I visit has a British member who will toss it around sometimes).
"You black b*tch," she screamed. She then turned the corner and walked past Lady P and me.
The woman, and from this point forward for just a bit I'll refer to her as the white girl, got about 15 yards from us when two gals came roaring around the corner. They were not white gals. Nor were they African Americans as the UK does not have African Americans. For the sake of keeping things simple, I'm going to say they were black women.
The three women faced off, some words were exchanged.
Three black guys came zipping around the corner and stood behind the two women.
The next bit happened really fast. I turned my head to the left, looking for the police, and had the someone should call the police thought just as I heard a glass break. As I turned back to see what had caused the broken-glass sound I noticed two cops kneeling on the back of one of the guys and to cuffing him. Apparently I'd missed the part where one of the policemen had extended his baton and cracked the guy on the back as he encouraged him to get on the ground.
The policemen had pulled up in their van and were out the doors in time to see the guy throw a bottle and catch the white girl in the head (which knocked her to the ground and led to bleeding).
Crime scene tape was extended around the area and an ambulance was called.
Then the youngest-looking policeman you've ever seen in your life came over to Lady P and me. He was wearing one of those really cool British Bobby hats like you see on TV (or on the streets if you live in London, UK). He took the hat off when he interviewed us.
We gave statements and it was during the statement-giving process when it became apparent that being politically correct wasn't going to work and that the most-clear description was going to involve "white girl", "black girls" and "black guys." African American wasn't working for the Brits involved and I didn't know where else to go. (Every time I said "African American" I realized how wrong it was.)
The white gal eventually climbed into the ambulance under her own power.
Lady P and I eventually hailed a cab.
Here's a photo for you. The Houses Of Parliament and Big Ben just across the Thames.
Posted by delmer at 3:43 AM | Comments (2)
August 26, 2007
From Crowthorne to London
This is a quicky people.
Saturday's trip from Crowthorne to London looked like this:
Very nice, you're thinking. Lady Penelope has highlights.. Mostly this photo was taken to show the right-hand steering wheel in Lady P's car and as an attempt to show the speedometer, which doesn't show up all that well.
Zeroing in on the speedometer you'll notice:
We eventually climbed over 90 but stopped short of 95. And that's miles per hour folks, not kilometers. (On the way to the boonies, which I'll blog about later, we did top out over the magic 100 mph.)
Posted by delmer at 3:19 PM | Comments (4)
Leaving Gatwick for Crowthorne
(Yes, this appears as Sunday's entry, but we're still talking about Saturday the 25th of August.)
The plane touched down in Gatwick right around when it was supposed to and we all pulled our bags down out of the overheads. (Well, mine was already in the floor as I had been typing on the computer and had placed it totally and securely under the seat in front of me.)
During the flight I'd noticed a young guy who looked a bit like Seth Green. There was something about him that said, I've done this before and I know where I'm going and I figured it might do me well to keep an eye on him. If you know me you know that I have a long stride and I take very quick steps; Seth had shorter legs but it would turn out he moved them rapidly and we were probably two of the quicker folks heading toward Immigration. (Seth would eventually get in the Immigration line that catered to British Citizens — in a US Supermarket this would have been called the Express Line and it moved very rapidly — while I got into the line catering to people from all over the world (but mainly Jamaica) that moved rapidly enough but was so full of people it was like being second in line at the local KFC.
My turn at the Immigration counter came about 60 minutes after we landed in Gatwick. The gal behind the counter asked me a few questions — where are you from (America), where are you going (Crowthorne), is your visit for business or vacation (vacation), what is the average airspeed of a swallow (European or African?) — and then I was on my way to baggage reclaim.
In baggage reclaim I found my bags. Or most of them anyway. The handle had come off one and the other was missing a zipper pull (I'll have to check the warranty on these things).
Then I found Lady Penelope.
Lady P had been worried about me fitting in her car. It is small but not as small as she had feared and it's one of those models that had plenty of headroom and legroom (unlike, what was it? the Nissan Pathfinder that had me all bunched up years ago when I was shopping for a new car). We loaded up and shot off.
First stop: McDonald's.
You'll notice that the UK's Ronald McDonald is a little hipper than the American version (though ours appears to be just as happy).
[By the way, I had a Grilled Chicken Salad without dressing and a large (UK beverage technology has not progressed to the point of Super Sized drinks) Diet Coke.]
When I left home the local McDonald's was promoting Surf's Up; so it the UK Micky D's.
After McDonald's we blasted down the, wait, this is more boring than what I had to eat. Unfortunately I can't be stopped, so how about if I do some compression — all told, we were on the M23, M25 and the M3 to get from Gatwick to Crowthorne.
The final McDonald's tidbit: Micky D's brought with it my first opportunity to use my credit card to make a purchase. The gal behind the counter took my card and put it in the Chip and Pin Reader. My cards, neither of them, have a chip so they wouldn't work when put in the top slot of the reader. The swiper part of the gizmo wouldn't read the card either.
So, Lady P bought breakfast.
Then we rolled into Crowthorne, chez Lady Penelope.
Posted by delmer at 8:17 AM | Comments (0)
August 25, 2007
The London Arrival
As I am in the airplane, soaring eastward and nearing a Gatwick landing, let's do a travel recap:
Hey, hey, hey (say that excitedly, not Fat Alberty) we're over land and we may have been for a while. It's 8:30 local time. Theoretically, we should have been on the ground 30 minutes ago.
(It looks like we're over water again. Does anybody remember what the UK looks like? They should have made it square or rectangular. Something Colorado-like. That way you wouldn't have this ocean-land-ocean-land problem when you were flying over and as soon as you saw land the first time you'd know you were almost wherever you were going. That first bit of land would have been Ireland.)
(Over land again.)
All told, the delay was about 2 hours.
(I think we're flying over the southern tip of the UK. I can see water off in the distance and we're approaching ocean in front of us.)
Exiting the recap, and I probably should have done this a bullet point or so ago…
We've been in the air for roughly 6 hours and 11 minutes and per the info we were given at take-off we should be on the ground in 20 minutes.
(As I finish this up on the Thursday following the Saturday it happened I'm having a bit of trouble remembering if we landed in the 20 minutes I expected. We were delayed five or ten minutes due to heavy traffics and had to circle a bit.)
None of what I've typed should be construed as complaining. I've had a great flight and everybody I've interacted with has been wonderful. Sometimes things just happen.
Posted by delmer at 9:27 AM | Comments (0)
It's a Small World - Posting from England
Guys and Gals, I've fallen a bit behind in posting. I'd hoped to post daily or to at least post several entries every several days so that I'd have one entry per day and create the illusion, for future generations digging through the archives, that I kept up with things. While I fully intend to still try to pull that off over the next couple of days I thought I'd make a quick entry about something that happened to me this past Saturday night.
That would be Saturday night in London, England.
As a birthday present Lady Penelope took me to see Spamalot at The Palace Theater in London.
Spamalot was incredible. Very good. I can't begin to describe just how good it was. You should see it if you can.
Lady P had hired a car to take us to the theater and our driver arrived promptly at the arranged time.
Wait, no. Lady P's father drove us to the theater following a meal prepared by Lady P's mother. (Lady P's parents are incredible. Very good. I can't begin to describe just how nice they were. You should see them if you can. I'll provide their address at the bottom of this post.)
Anyway, we took our seats a short while before the show started. We had seats one and two (at the aisle) in a row that was entirely empty and Lady P commented that we shouldn't get too comfortable as we'd likely have to get up a few times to let people by.
As it happens, we had to stand but once.
As the group of six-or-so people passed by us I caught ear of their conversation (and accents) and asked where they were from. "Cleveland," said one of the women,
"I'm from Columbus," I replied.
And there you have it. I'd traveled all the way from Columbus, Ohio to London, England to sit and watch a play next to people I live two hours from (give or take).
At the intermission (or interval, as they say here) Lady Penelope and I went to the bar to collect drinks we'd pre-ordered. As we returned to the theater one of the men from the Ohio group was just leaving and said, "Can you believe it? Intermission is almost over and my wife just now decided she's thirsty."
Having been married before, I believed it.
When the gentleman returned he commented that the line at the bar had been too long and that he'd given up. He also mentioned that he and his wife weren't actually from Cleveland, but from Norwalk, Ohio. While I was very tempted to say, "The home of the Norwalk virus," I instead went with, "Do you know any Smiths?"
("Smith," of course, is not the real name and is used in place of a rather uncommon (to me, anyway) last name.)
"I know a John Smith," he said. "My wife and I work with him," and he continued and mentioned the place the John Smith I know works.
"I know his son, John Jr." I said. "As a matter of fact, John Jr. and his wife are the godparents of my oldest child."
And there you have it. I'd traveled all the way from Columbus, Ohio to London, England to sit and watch a play next to people I live two hours from (give or take) and who work with the father of my oldest child's godfather (whose wife I'd gone to high school with).
[Ah. This is the part where Lady P's parent's contact info should be. I know you knew I was kidding.]
Posted by delmer at 7:25 AM | Comments (4)
August 24, 2007
The London Departure -- Darrold
You'll have to read the comments from the earlier entry to appreciate the coolness of this. I mean, how often do you say "Live Free or Die?" (New Hampshire residents need not reply. By the way Darrell, I love you too man, and when I type it I tear up just a little.)
The above was on the side of a bus outside of LaGuardia in NYC.
The following is a picture of me in Columbus airport at 10 a.m. and is provided for my college buddies who may fear that turning 47 has sucked the life out of me.
In other travel news ...
The flight leaving Columbus got a late start which led to a late landing.
One of the first things I came across in the LaGuardia terminal was a Nathan's hot dog place. I'd considered stopping for a dog — I've never had a Nathan's — but decided I'd head down to baggage claim. My bags were just coming around the carousel as I approached it. I collected them, shot out the door, and bought a ticket for the bus to JFK.
About an hour after I got on the bus I was at JFK and in the line for International Departures. Not only did the line move quickly but the ticket agent that processed me gave me a $7.50 lunch voucher since my original flight had been canceled. I took that voucher to the terminal Chili's and turned it into a $30.00 lunch tab (I thought I should have three beers in order to prepare me for the sleeping I intended to do on the flight to England).
So far, even with the bumps and the very long layover, things haven't been too bad.
My plane leaves in another hour and a half and I can see that it has been moved from the original gate to a new gate of departure. There's also a warning about some sort of possible FAA delay.
We'll have to see what happens.
Posted by delmer at 6:02 PM | Comments (3)
The London Departure -- Nerds in Paradise (Columbus, Ohio)
I woke up very early this morning, something like 4:30 a.m., to start my day of travel.
I was at the airport right around 6 or so (for a 10:50 flight) and at the check-in line a few minutes after that. Within ten minutes of getting in line I'd been advised my flight to England — Flight 3 — had been canceled. Following some furious typing I was booked on a new flight: Flight 1.
With Flight 1, which sounds like it should arrive in London two flights before Flight 3, comes an additional bit of layover in New York. So now it's about seven hours instead of five and, as a bonus, I fly into La Guardia and fly out of JFK (which is how my trip to Paris shook out 31 years ago). I land in London about 90 minutes later than originally planned.
I'm currently at Columbus International Airport, sitting at a table at an empty gate. I've got wireless and an electrical outlet and have used Skype to pass on my new travel arrangements to Prince Charles. He's calling the other guys involved and is trying to move the fox hunt back a couple of hours.
Just as I was getting ready to post this entry I noticed another nerd in this, otherwise, deserted gate area. He has another table setup not too far from me. What caught my attention was that he had a microphone hanging from his neck, was talking, and I thought he was Skyping someone. Then I noticed the video camera he had pointed at himself and started listening to what he was saying; he's making a travel journal.
I walked over and introduced myself as another nerd and we chatted briefly. He's on his way to China to teach English.
Anyway, here are some photos:
A bird was my only company until the other nerd arrived.
And an airplane. Whattayawant? It's an airport.
Posted by delmer at 8:19 AM | Comments (0)
August 23, 2007
It's My Birthday
Forty-seven big years. Do you remember when I said I thought I'd always be 17?
Last night my mother, my children and I had cake and strawberry pie filling. The cake is a common birthday treat though the pie filling is something new. I got the impression that it was an idea my youngest came up with. And it was very good; strawberry pie without the pesky crust to contend with (it seemed like a healthy treat).
Tonight TDHG is preparing dinner for me and the boys and I'm zipping into work early today so I can leave early and not suffer from any guilty feelings. (We need to leave the Special Birthday Dinner Event in time to make it to football practices, so dinner will start a bit earlier than usual. Though, I guess, as I age dinner will start earlier and earlier as a matter of course.)
I have gotten so much done the last three days that I think it would be good for the company if they sent me on a long vacation every three or four months. I'd need this in addition to the normal days I take for children being sick.
The Issue Trak install may have been the thing bothering me the last couple of days. It was sorted out last night just before 6 p.m. and this morning the Stress Knot is gone. Of course, I also got Oreos, Zip-Loc bags (several sizes: 1-quart up to body-bag size), a big bag of Jelly Belly Jelly Beans, those horrible chocolate-covered pretzels, and new underwear. I took care of a few other things off yesterday's list and maybe it's a combination of all of them that has helped me chill.
In other soon-to-be-traveling news:
There was a message on my machine last night that my glasses are back with new lenses so I'll be able to leave the Pacer-lensed Specs home. It's all coming together.
I checked on the address of another friend in England to see where he lives as I thought it might be a short walk to his house. How big can England be? If you were to raze all the pubs there's only be about a dozen buildings left standing. Anyway, his house is in Bishops Caundle in Dorset which is about 94 miles from where I'll be headquartered. The walk would be nothing to an Aussie and I've gone farther on a bicycle. However, I'm not sure the Brits do as much in-country travel as do the people they've exiled and those of us that escaped their iron-fisted rule. (You may recall from your history books that they used to be very keen on travel.) My friend probably isn't home anywyay; there's a pub right across the street from his house… he's probably over there having a warm one even as I type.
Hey, I just noticed that there's a Wells, UK. It's about the same distance from Crowthorne as Bishops Caundle is. It's just outside of Wookey Hole and if Wookey Hole isn't just screaming to have some sort of sexual-innuendo comment made about it nothing is. I mean, Maidenhead, well that's a bit obvious, but Wookey Hole, that can go either way. Not to mention it is the obvious title for any Star Wars-Themed porn.
From the Ancient Gatehouse website (Americans should really click the link and look at some of the pictures there. They're beautiful and make me feel sort of bad for even wondering how anybody could name a place Wookey Hole Caves):
Wookey Hole Caves: On the outskirts of Wells are to be found these famous caves. Once owned by Madame Tussaud's, along with the oldest working paper mill and a marvellous 19th Century penny arcade! The caverns themselves are breathtaking and guided tours are available.
Hot Fuzz was filmed in Wells! That has got to be the best movie ever made about a British cop getting moved to a small out-of-the-way village. Blockbuster was out of Hot Fuzz the other day when I went to rent it and when the guy behind the counter told me it wasn't all that good I proudly said that seen it in the theater.
Where was I? Hmmm.
Well, I've got to get my hands on a Wells, UK shirt.
Anyway, I'd best get off to work.
Cheers, y'all.
Posted by delmer at 4:30 AM | Comments (10)
August 22, 2007
The Stress Knot
Today I am reinstalling a Windows Server 2003 installation and slapping SQL Server 2005 on top of it. This will be followed by an install of Issue Trak that we're testing for usability at work.
I had everything installed up to the point of failure yesterday. That is, everything was up and running to the point of Issue Trak issuing an error I couldn't sort out. After about an hour of trying to figure out what was wrong I realized that I could, likely, spend hours on the problem and still not be much further along. Reinstalling the whole thing might be faster I decided.
And that's where I am.
Yesterday's troubleshooting was hindered by the fact I had one contact in and the other (in my weaker eye) out due to eyeball soreness. As my regular glasses are in the shop getting fitted for new (bifocal) lenses I'm wearing a pair of $6.00 glasses I got at the supermarket about six years ago. I can see incredibly well out of them and would use them all the time if they didn't have lenses in them the size of Pacer windshields.
I may have to take them to England with me.
And this brings us to the stress knot.
I'm very excited about the trip to the United Kingdom. I've recently talked with and e-mailed some local and in-country Brits and they've all assured me that the UK is more United and Kingdomy than it has been in recent memory, so the time seems right to visit.
Yet, this morning I had a stress knot. Now, the good thing about the stress knot is that without the upcoming trip I'd have no idea what was causing it. Once in a while I'll get a knot for no discernible reason right in my left pectoral muscle and I'll puzzle over it wondering what is wrong. It won't keep me from sleeping as some troubling things might and I think that is odd. I don't remember the divorce causing a stress knot, although it did bring with it many sleepless nights.
I don't feel anxious and, and this was a surprise to me, my pulse is currently 48 bpm (I took it twice. Why is it never that good when I'm at the doctor?). Oh, I could drone one about my thoughts on the subconscious mind, but why? I'm just going to accept the fact that sometimes when I have a stress knot that there are things I can't put my finger on that are stressing me out.
Some of those things are very good and exciting.
So, what do I have to do in the next two days?
Posted by delmer at 7:22 AM | Comments (2)
August 21, 2007
LOST
LOST
Thus read the note I stuck on one of the refrigerators at work late last night.
Now, I know the container isn't lost. It has been tossed out by whomever was charged with cleaning the fridges last week. And I understand, completely, why it was tossed: it is far too time consuming to look at the container, notice is has chicken in it, and keep it on the shelf.
It is much more economical — from a fridge-cleaning approach — to simply scoop stuff into a big trash can.
And it isn't like we aren't given a warning. Each Friday before the big Frigidaire purge an announcement is made warning us the kitchen is about to be cleaned and that if we want to save anything we should scurry on down to the cafeteria.
Yes, yes, yes. I understand.
As a matter of fact we run by a similar set of rules in IT. Before someone's network password expires they receive a warning that states, "You have six grace logins before your password expires. Would you like to change your password now?" Six eventually decrements down to one if a person continues to login, day after day, without creating a new password. If the person fails to change passwords before running out of grace logins they are locked out. When that happens I, knowing the person will have no use whatsoever for any of their data as they can no longer access it, run a script that purges anything they've ever touched from our network.
It's a big time saver for me and lets me get out of work twenty seconds earlier.
No. Wait. I don't do that.
When you get right down to it, the container is my responsibility. And it never really had a chance. I took chicken in to work for lunch on Thursday and forgot to eat it. I forgot to eat it Friday as well although I remembered it that night before I went to bed. By then the container's fate had been sealed (burped and sealed, if I may) and I decided not to worry about it until Monday morning.
Oh yea, and my grandparents all passed a long, long time ago.
Posted by delmer at 5:53 PM | Comments (2)
August 20, 2007
Shoe Buying
Jack needed shoes. Well, all the boys did but Jack got his Sunday. And this is how the shopping trip went.
The boys and I drove to Target, walked in the front door and headed to the shoe department. As we turned off a main aisle in to shoes — and I mean like two steps out of the main aisle — I saw a pair of blue and white tennis shoes and asked, "Jack, do you like these?"
"Yes. I do." he said. "And look, this pair is an 11 just like I wear."
We tried on an 11 and an 11 1/2 before going with the 11. Jack then said, "I'll be in video games," and I was left to shop a bit as his brothers trailed after him.
Total time spent shoe shopping: Fewer than 5 minutes. Fewer than $20.00 spent.
Jack truly shops like a man.
Compare that to:
Samson needed shoes.
Friday night we went to Dick's to look for Nike Shox. They didn't have Shox in Samson's size so we looked at many other pair. While we looked, Haydn found a pair of shoes he liked and we got those.
Shoxless, we drove to The Sports Authority. They were out of Shox in Samson's size. We looked at many other shoes but didn't find anything that met Sam's needs.
We drove to Famous Footwear and arrived 10 minutes after they closed.
Saturday we woke up and, after football practice, went to Famous Footwear again. They had no Shox at all and out of the 100s of pairs of shoes they had, Sam didn't find any he really liked.
We drove to Tuttle Mall to visit The Finish Line. No Shox in Sam's size.
We drove to Westland Mall, which is not all that far from Famous Footwear, to visit The Finish Line there. They had Shox although the Shox they had were $30.00 more than the already insane amount the Shox we were looking for cost. We tried on the ungodly expensive Shox thinking we'd find the size that fit and order the insanely expensive pair for delivery. There was only one problem, the insanely expensive pair was not available when we went to order it.
In the end we got the ungodly expensive pair of shoes and put some conditions on their wear. No skateboarding in them, no digging holes in them, no "anything" but wearing them to school.
I have never paid as much for a pair of my own shoes as I paid for Sammo's and I normally get two pair for what I paid for his. I sweat over every dollar if I'm buying something for myself but am a little quicker to spend money on the children (or so it seems). Samson made it easy to buy the shoes as he wasn't in a whiney-I-need-these state; he was being a little gentleman.
A little gentleman with expensive tastes.
(We've already had the conversation in which I explain that spending a fortune for kids shoes will not be a recurring Wells-family theme.)
Posted by delmer at 8:42 AM | Comments (4)
August 19, 2007
The Real Planning
I thought I should post this as men seem to get little credit for being able to plan much of anything that doesn't involve getting more beer.
Last Sunday I was speaking with Lady Penelope on the phone. (Remember when plain, old, long distance calls cost a fortune? Using Skype I can call a land line in the UK for 2.1 cents a minute and using my house phone it is something like 7 cents a minute.)
During the call I received e-mail notification that my passport was to be delivered to my home on Wednesday. As passport application processing has been privatized I had some confidence that this might, in fact, be the case.
At some point in the past Lady Penelope had foolishly suggested if I ever had the chance to visit the UK that I should. Now I had the chance and the best time, due to both of our schedules, would be the sooner the better.
I went to Iaconno's Pizza, ordered dinner, and made some calls.
At the end of a small pizza and a salad I had arranged childcare and gotten the time off. Shortly after that I'd paid less than $200 for a flight. So, in just a few short hours I'd arranged to travel overseas (and I had backup airline tickets a click away should they be needed).
(Prior to all of this, and this is a big part of the planning, I'd actually checked on my remaining vacation days and applied them against what I knew I needed to make it to the end of the year. As it happens I have my children the week of Christmas and I get three of those days free. That's almost an entire week of vacation I didn't have to save.)
The next day I checked on Travel Health Insurance (Lady P tipped me to this). If something happens I now have $1,000.000 coverage for medical problems.
I also bought some luggage. I'm convinced I could travel to Europe with nothing more than a carry-on duffel bag, but I thought it best not to be cramped for space and went to Triple-A for something larger and on wheels. I also picked up a travel pillow as I hope to sleep between my stints behind the yoke. And I bought an adapter that turns normal, American-sized plugs into the monstrous jobs they have in the UK (and Africa, per the adapter packaging); my notebook power supply accepts US and UK current so the adapter will allow me to charge the Dell and the items I plug into it: my phone, my PDA, my iPod and my nose hair trimmer.
In the time that has passed I've taken care of getting prescriptions filled; the stuff I take weekly and something to deal with cat allergies if I still have them (I haven't had a bad cat reaction since I've had my hormones straightened out).
And I've started buying travel gifts. British people are hard to buy for. They already have everything. The monarchy. Camilla. Graham Norton.
[Do you think Camilla is their Hillary? If you say "Hillary" here in the states, everybody knows who you are talking about. (The same holds true for "Barack", but that's a gimme.) I'll bet that if you mention "Camilla" in the UK, everybody there knows who you mean. A lot of us here know her and we rarely know anything that happens outside the contiguous 48.]
The Brits I'm likely to see in a visiting capacity don't seem to be the type of people who wear a lot of sports-team related T-Shirts or baseball caps like we do here. Maybe the British, generally speaking, shy away from such things. Which raises the question: How they tell the Dale Earnhardt Jr. fans from the Jeff Gordon Fans. Should I expect to see a lot of Bristol Figher Ts in roundabouts sporting 8s and 3s on their back hatch window? (Yes, I know, (because I had to look), Jeff Gordon is 24. I keep seeing 3s and 8s in windows here, though.)
I used to approach gift giving as if just having me around were gift enough. However, after the disastrous Christmas of 1997 I sort of rethought that and believe I am just one or two years away from having my children forgive me fully. With that in mind I've been picking modest travel gifts up here and there.
Oh, one more thing. I'd been thinking about getting a Man Bag to tote my personal effects around in (just in case Scotland Yard stops me on the street and asks for papers), to keep things in I might buy, and for transporting the piece of the Henge I hope to chip off. I looked at several items and finally went with a single-strap Nike backpack. It was lightweight, had plenty of pockets and, most importantly when it comes to carrying something called a "Man Bag," looked the least like a pair of testicles on a strap. (Click the following link to see just how much women dig a guy with a Man Bag.)
I would never carry a backpack around on the streets here (and you've seen what I tool around town in), but nobody knows me over there. And if they are able to sort out that I'm an American they may just assume it's very common over here and not think anything of it. They'll probably just be tickled that I'm not part of an invasion force. (Someone has suggested the Ninja suit my be good to wear during the flight as it might be comfortable and good for the circulation. I don't know that I'll chance it but I do plan on taking my compression socks.)
Posted by delmer at 5:53 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
August 18, 2007
Planning the Trip
Okay. As we learned yesterday, I'll be going to England next week. I leave Columbus on August 24 at 10:50 a.m. and arrive in Gatwick at 6:20 a.m. on Saturday. What does that look like? Nineteen and a half hours of travel? Let's see, I gain five by traveling to the UK and I have a five-hour layover in NYC so air time is closer to eight or nine hours.
Eeeek?! You scream. A five-hour layover?
Well it is the Big Apple. And before you eeeek too much, you should know that I paid $197.44 for the flight. And had I booked it 30 days in advance it would have been $122.44. Of course, you need to have access to some frequent-flier miles to make the magic work.
How did it all happen?
I hardly ever take vacation by myself. Sure, the last couple of years I've jetted off to New Jersey for long weekends to visit a buddy, but those were weekends and cost me a mere one vacation day each.
My problem is that I'm afraid to use my vacation and I like to save it up in case I have a sick child and need a couple of days off. Unfortunately, it isn't uncommon when using this method of vacation conservation to find that the end of the year rolls around and I have vacation left I need to use or I'll lose it when the New Year starts.
Recently I decided, as part of my SLOG, to be more sociable and less uptight. (Yes, I know. Based on some of the things I post it's hard to believe I have any uptightness in me.)
My first crack at getting out more took me to the Backgammon Tournament in Philly, where I happened to run into Lady Penelope — one of the tournament players, a WADLL commenter, and a real, live British citizen.
I'm pretty sure Lady Penelope was impressed by my familiarity with English geography (Leeds, Kent, and Brighton, specifically), the history of the British Empire, my fondness for Queen Elizabeth and King Dons and my general Anglophileness as at one point she said, "You really need to come to England to get your facts sorted out, you cheeky bugger." ("Cheeky bugger," I believe, means "big American stud.")
And then one day, last Sunday to be exact, I receive e-mail notification that my passport had been mailed and should arrive at my house Wednesday (that is, three days ago). Coincidentally, when the notification came I had Lady P on the phone (I had called to share what I knew about St. Giles (Edinburgh) with her) and mentioned the imminent arrival of the passport to her. "I can take you up on your invitation to visit, now," I said.
"Invitation?" She paused for a second, I think to check her calendar. "Oh, I'd hate to put you out. The house is a mess and the tea pot's broken. Surely you're busy."
"No," I said, "Not really. I work in IT and, as you know, computers mostly run themselves after you get the OS installed."
"But I have cats, four of them, and I know you have that dreadful allergy. There's really no need for you to go out of your way to stop by."
"Not to worry. I can hold my breath longer than most men," I assured her. "I doubt I'll even notice the cats."
"Did I say 'four cats?' I meant eight. And one of them is having kittens as we speak. Nine now. Ten…"
"I'll breathe through my ears if I have to and use my ear hairs to filter the cat dander out," I continued.
"Oh," she paused, "If you're going to be in the neighborhood anyway, I suppose I could show you around one afternoon. Be sure to bring nylons and chocolates."
The British are nothing if not accommodating.
Oh, and as like to leave the readership of WADLL with informational tidbits, I'll share with you the same bits of British history that I used to win Lady Penelope over.
St. Giles
From the depths of the crypt at St Giles
Came a scream that resounded for miles.
Said the vicar, ‘Good gracious !
Has Father Ignatius
Forgotten the Bishop has piles?
Leeds
There once was a man from Leeds
Who swallowed a package of seeds.
Great tufts of grass
Sprouted out of his ass
And his balls were covered in weeds!
I'll let you research the last two a bit yourselves.
Kent
There once was a man from Kent
Brighton
There was a young sailor from Brighton
Posted by delmer at 8:59 PM | Comments (3)
The Perfect Storm of Sports Practices
It is a beautiful day in Central Ohio. It's cool and not humid at all.
Jack and Haydn had football practice at 8:30 this morning and both practices were at the same field. Many of you parents that have children participating in multiple activities will appreciate the rareness of this event. It is far more common to have two children needing to be at two different locations ten minutes apart from each other than it is to have to children at the same place at the same time.
Football practice was scheduled to end at 10:00 a.m.
But wait! There's a bonus.
Child three had soccer practice at 9:30 a.m. I know, it looks dicey. Would I be able to get him to soccer practice and then get to the other boys in time so that I'd look like a responsible father by not leaving them standing around alone too long.
As it happens, I would.
Soccer practice was at the same park.
Here's an incredibly poor-quality video of Samson (the 10-year old) practicing.
Posted by delmer at 11:38 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
August 17, 2007
May 1986
In May of 1986 I was working for a non-profit organization doing a job that required putting in a lot of long hours. Most of the folks I worked with were my age.
One night six or seven of us were sitting around talking and someone mentioned a trip they'd take abroad. Pretty soon everybody was talking about trips they'd taken to Europe or other faraway, exotic lands. That is, everybody except Laura and me.
Eventually the group split up and Laura and I were left alone.
"I felt like the biggest hick," she said after the last person walked away, "when everybody started talking about the trips they'd taken when I haven't been anywhere. Didn't you?"
"Well," I said, "I've been to France."
When I was 15 I went with the high school French Club.
The point of this it so say that I'm not always one to talk about the more exotic things I'm going to do. Sure, if I'm going to pedal a 20-year old bicycle 60 miles to and from London, Ohio, I'll tell you all about it well before it happens (what kind of blogger would I be if I didn't give you something to look forward to reading?). But to say I'm going to be in London, England a week from today feels out of character for me.
I told my boss right away, after all he had to OK the vacation time. And our HR person. And Steve, a guy at work who goes on cruises every year. And another guy at work who asked me to help him with a weekend project next week. Today I mentioned it to MikeO as I figured he'd read about it tonight.
Maybe I don't want to seem boastful. I don't know. And maybe I've got this backwards, anybody could go to Europe on pretty short notice (if you have a passport) but I'm not sure anybody should just haul off and pedal a 45-pound bike over hill and dale for 60 miles. Or even do a 60-miler in Central Ohio which is seriously lacking in hills and dales. (I said should there.)
Still, going to Europe seems a lot neater. Especially when you're pretty sure they're going to let you fly the plane a little bit.
Oh, I leave the day after my birthday (which is August 23rd) , so if you're sending a thong, get it in the mail. I need something to wear to the beach.
Posted by delmer at 9:32 PM | Comments (5)
August 16, 2007
Thunder and Lightning
Last night, somewhere around two or three in the morning, we had a serious storm roll through central Ohio. It woke me up and just about everybody I saw today at work mentioned the storm.
From the comfort of my bed I could tell it was spectacular and I thought to myself that if it were earlier in the evening I'd have gone outside, on my porch, to watch the lightning.
What was so interesting was that instead of bursts of thunder there was a continuous growling of thunder punctuated with larger bursts. This went on for several minutes and it finally occurred to me I had my phone in bed with me and that it had video capability.
Unfortunately the storm was moving pretty fast and by the time I thought to record any of it the constant growling of thunder had subsided leaving, and this is what I captured, your basic light and sound show.
It really isn't much to look at but since it woke me up, and is the reason I'm beat and going to bed early, I thought I'd share it.
Posted by delmer at 10:09 PM | Comments (2)
August 15, 2007
Hilliard 43026
I was Googling for my Doctor's phone number today and typed in Hilliard Medical Center. When the following hit came up my first thought was that the zip code was mistyped. Then I noticed the phone number and address and the FL denoting Florida.
Hilliard Medical Center
Hilliard, FL 32046
Phone: (904) 845-xxxx
The Hilliard, Ohio zip code is 43026. The same numbers as Hilliard, Florida, but in a different order.
I just thought it was interesting and thought I'd share.
Ah. One more thing. You've got eight shopping / baking days until my birthday. I'm turning 47 this year on the 23rd of August. I wear an XL shirt and prefer that you not buy anything with long sleeves; even the XL-Tall items fall short of getting my arm length right on me.
I probably wear a medium or large thong, and while I believe blue brings out my eyes I'm not sure that's important when it comes to thong-wear.
If you choose to go the mailing something you've baked route, I'm partial to oatmeal raisin cookies. The big, soft, doughy ones. Or, if you prefer, you could just send some raw cookie dough. I know a person isn't supposed to eat it, but I'll worry about that when it arrives.
Posted by delmer at 5:50 PM | Comments (6)
August 14, 2007
Impressions
Today I'm going to do am impression for you. This is an impression that is best done in person as things like this are hard to pull off in print. You'll have to bear with me and play along with the printed stage directions I provide. You'll also have to forgive me if I've done the impression for you before and accept the fact that this is provided as much for the tie-in to what follows it as anything else.
Here we have it: My Impression of my Ex-Wife's Impression of Me in Bed.
You've got to understand that this will read very fast, but it took a bit longer. Oh, and this would have been the 29-year old version of me. The dialog is just mine in the beginning, the ex had a speaking part as well but her dialog isn't all that important until the end. And I'm not going to get into the blocking of the scene. Please feel free to hum a bad piece of Jazz to yourself as you read this.
The impression starts now:
Delmer: " "
(That is, Delmer is being very quiet.)
(Then Delmer reaches the exciting, climactic end.)
Delmer: (In the form of an excited sigh of relief) "Hooooo." (Followed quickly, with an upbeat tone by, and while maintaining the position favored by Missionaries the world over) "Hey, I read in the Dispatch today…"
The Future Ex: "Delmer! Be quiet! We're having sex… I don't want to talk about current events."
And this may be what eventually brought the marriage to an end. We never talked. (And, of course, I'm kidding about that.)
Another time while we were practicing making children (and I should point out that practice makes perfect as demonstrated by the three adorable boys we'd eventually produce) we had the following experience.
The impression starts now:
(A bunch of stuff goes on. We're wrestling and one of us is very close to being pinned.)
The Future Ex: "Delmer… Delmer…"
Delmer: (I quit wrestling for a moment and pause) "What?"
I thought she wanted to ask me a question! God, I'm laughing as I type this. Maybe it's not as funny in print, I don't know. You really should have been there. I thought she wanted to ask me something, so I stopped what I was doing!
Now, in all fairness, "Delmer" is an uncommon thing to hear when you're having sex. Seriously. Ladies, try tossing a "Delmer" or two out next time you're entwined with a man (or lesbian lover, depending on your desires) and see if that doesn't bring a break in the action.
Really, I think I should get some sort of credit for listening. Don't women always complain that men never listen to them? And this brings us to a whole different experiment… Ladies, try that "Delmer" thing from the last paragraph and see if your guy (or gal) even notices.
I do not need to know the results of any of your experiments. Especially from you, Mom; I know that dad is a "Delmer."
Hey, I could be worse:
Posted by delmer at 7:10 AM | Comments (8)
August 13, 2007
Comment
CravenGirl asked, (In SLOG Revisited):
Call me curious, but how did you KNOW she wasn't going to have sex with you?
I can't help but think that many others of you wondered the same thing, but hesitated to ask.
Of course some additional others, the female readers who have been here a long time, simply said to yourselves (using the voice in your head you reserve for situations like, "Oh… parallel park? Hmmm. I think not. Maybe there's a spot farther down."), "It sounds like she's met him. That's all the explanation I need."
Male readers — regardless of how long they've been visiting WADLL — don't even question how I know. They just accept it for what it is. Some of them may wonder what I do to deal with sexual frustration. Am I one of those guys who spends time watching NASCAR? Do I knit? Do I spend hour after hour practicing my parallel parking? But they all accept it.
Back to the question.
On any day of the week, I'm just certain sex isn't going to happen. Generally speaking it's a time saver and a person gets a lot more done if he approaches life with an attitude similar to, "Well, I know I'm not having sex today, maybe I'll stain the deck or see if I can't put the tractor-trailer in the spot that Mini Cooper just pulled out of."
There are five or six other things I wanted to go into that I thought might provide a more personal, deeper explanation, but typing all this up has reminded me that I've got cars to park.
Posted by delmer at 12:47 AM | Comments (4)
August 12, 2007
The Start of Saturday's Ride
Historically speaking, prior to a long bicycle ride I have breakfast at Mel's Diner. (More simply speaking, most Saturdays I have breakfast at Mel's Diner.)
And that's how I started this last pre-ride Saturday.
Wait, before I get to the exiting food-part of this entry, we need to take a side trip.
Jodi recently made a post about having pie for breakfast.
Whenever I think of pie, and I mean every time, I think of the line, "You shouldn't give your pie away with breakfast… it makes you look cheap," uttered by Alec Baldwin in a sketch he did with Jan Hooks on SNL a long time ago.
This may be the video. However, I recall an exchange in the video I saw going like this:
Hooks (Waitress): You know what you want?
Baldwin (Cowboy): I know what I see!
Followed by other choppy, innuendo-filled dialog and ending with the free-pie comment. In the link above there is choppy, innuendo-filled dialog, and the free-pie crack, but it's missing the "You know what you want"/"I know what I see" stuff. Also, in the sketch I remember Baldwin stands in the door most of the time. Of course, I could be misremembering some of the points. However, as I sit typing this I think they may have done this sketch a couple of times over the course of the show.
And, as is too often the case, I've sort of drifted from where I wanted to go.
So, Thursday Jodi blogged about pie for breakfast.
Friday I was speaking with a friend who was considering how she might like to someday own a diner in a small town. It would give her a chance to see friends and customers each day and she thought she could serve breakfasts and maybe pie.
I said, "You shouldn't give your pie away with breakfast. It makes you look cheap." And then, of course, had to explain why I said it. The friend was kind enough to laugh.
Friday night I was watching a recording of Rules of Engagement. In the first scene Patrick Warburton and his wife are seated in a restaurant for breakfast. The waitress serves apple pie to Warburton and the wife says, "Apple pie for breakfast?"
Warburton says, "Here's my thinking on that. You'd be fine if I ordered apple Danish, which is basically flat apple pie."
Which gave me three very-close-together breakfast-and-pie encounters. And that made the following seem even more right Saturday morning.
After breakfast I shot over to Walgreen's to pick up a couple of bottles of Gatorade. Standing outside were two women a bit younger than I am and two girls about 6th- or 7th-grade age. One of the girls said they were collecting school supplies for the less-fortunate and wondered if I'd mind buying something from their list. I didn't mind at all and picked up some school supplies in addition to my Gatorade. I also purchased four bottles of water for the gals doing the collecting. Finally, I made a ten-dollar cash donation, just in case there was too much of some supplies and not enough of others.
[Regarding the school supplies and the donation: I had eaten out for breakfast. I was going to eat at the London KFC for lunch. I was pretty sure I'd be too tired post ride to cook for myself and that I'd eat out again. If I'm going to pay to eat out all day long, what kind of person would I be if I didn't give to help out others? I'll tell you the kind. I'd be like the woman I saw at Donato's last summer who said "no" asked if she wanted to buy a $1.00 kitchen magnet that had been designed by a child as part of a fund raiser for Children's Hospital. She spent more than $40.00 on pizza and balked at $1.00 for charity? "How Republican rotten of you," I thought. I don't get it. I spent $7.00 on lunch that day and bought one each of four different designs; I figured I should pick up her slack.]
I gave the bottled water to the adults and explained that I didn't think children should be taking gifts from strangers dressed like clowns.
When the women said they were from the Methodist Church around the corner. I asked if they meant the one with the sign that says "God is in the coffee." When they told me that was the one I asked what the sign meant and was told it was their way of inviting people in for coffee and donuts.
I told them I thought it might be a Methodist saying, sort of like the one we had when I was Southern Baptist: "We're going to Heaven and we know why you're not." (One of the women had already told me she'd been Southern Baptist when she lived down south; she knew exactly what I was talking about.)
You know, a lot of times when I type these up I have some sort of exit strategy right from the outset. Other times as I'm typing something just comes to me. Tonight… nothing. I may as well run for Congress.
How about some more pictures.
A shot of the London, Ohio Courthouse
A Church in London, Ohio
Another shot of the courthouse
Posted by delmer at 9:17 PM | Comments (5)
August 11, 2007
The Bike Ride and Bikers
As promised yesterday today you get an entry about a bicycle trip. And this entry involves a biker gang that tried to push me around.
Let's get to the bikers first.
I was in London, Ohio and on my way out of town when I remembered that a friend of mine, the one who will not be having sex with me on my birthday (wait, that list is endless) suggested that anytime I bike more than 50 miles I get her a shirt from wherever I've been. On the chance that she has some sort of I need X number of shirts from a boy before I bof him rule, I'm going along with it.
[As an aside, the friend in question and I were talking the other day and she asked what the logic chain was that suggests that if she puts cake on the table it means she's taking sex off it? Just for a second I paused, because I'm a guy and talking about sex does that to us, and then I said, "because I know it's not going to happen in any case, and I'm pretty sure that having our five children around would be a mood killer." Also, another couple may be there and I'm guessing that if the cake-baker and I disappeared for three hours they'd be offended.]
Alright. So I needed a shirt.
On the way out of town I saw a bar.
I checked the parking lot and noticed a couple of Harleys. Harleys are not really an indication of anything to worry about these days; most Harley riders are accountants and baby boomers who have gotten their kids out of the house and have scads of cash laying around. The point being I felt safe going into the bar. It was daylight, too.
Wait, the photo at the right shows what I was wearing.
I walked into the bar. It was very nice. The female bartenders looked like they could have been college coeds. The one odd thing about the bar was that there were people smoking and I thought that was against the law everywhere in Ohio now. Not that I was going to say anythings — sometimes people forget the law and light up without thinking. Of course, there were ashtrays out as well. Who knows? A part of me wondered if this bar was so tough that the police left it alone.
I needed a shirt and I wanted a beer. I got both and left.
When I left the bar I saw five biker-types coming down the street toward me; three biker dudes and two biker chicks. One of the biker dudes was on crutches and he was the one who started running his mouth.
Rats.
The cycling shorts are incredibly comfortable, the Williamsburg jersey is my favorite and I really don't give a shit about whether or not people think I look silly. Still, for a minute, I wished I had the blue jersey on, maybe some baggy shorts, and a handgun.
I bent over the back of the bike and attached my bike bag to the rack. The throng got closer and Crutches kept jabbering.
With the bag attached I stood up and faced the group. They stopped in their tracks. The guys faltered just a little bit and took a step back while the women seemed to lean in toward me a bit more. There was a sense of momentary confusion and then Crutches finally said, "have a safe ride," and the group went around me and into the bar.
I replayed the event over and over on the way home and I finally figured out what had happened and I think it comes down to shorts and sweat.
I was wearing my best pair of shorts. They have superior padding extending up over the mantools which improves the appearance of a man and I think less-evolved men (Harley Riders, and I say that to give you NASCAR fans a break), when they see a larger toolbox, may be so subconsciously intimidated that they are rendered speechless.
A man's sweat, as I'm sure you know, contains pheromones (eating a bit of celery seems to cause men to release pheromones as well; which certainly explains a lot of the hookups you see at a BW3), and I was sweating a lot. I think the women bikers were overcome by my super-sweaty sexiness.
I imagine the biker dudes are still sitting in the bar puzzled as to why they didn't kick the crap out of the bicyclist. Well, Crutches is probably wondering why he didn't beat me with his crutches. The gals are probably wondering why they didn't wrestle me to the ground and have their biker-chick way with me.
Or not.
Most of that, of course, didn't happen. While I feel just a bit guilty about wasting your time with it I'm watching Graham Norton as I type and, as he does with his show, nothing gets edited here tonight.
When I came out of the bar there were five biker types coming at me. Crutches was saying something and I honestly think he was yanking my chain a bit but I couldn't hear him over the air conditioner (or something) that was making a racket. I was pretty sure the tone was good-natured but I felt uncomfortable responding until I knew they were talking to me. When he got closer Crutches told me to have a good ride.
This seems to have gone on long enough for tonight. Tomorrow we'll go over the pre-ride meal and the start of the ride.
Some photos:
A lone tree among the soybeans
Barns and Silos
There are normally women lined up out the door at this place
Madison Lake
Posted by delmer at 10:35 PM | Comments (3)
August 10, 2007
Crazy Brits and Catching Up
"There's a crazy, rich, British guy…" started Jack, my 12-year old.
"Richard Branson?" I asked.
"I don't know. I saw something about him on TV. He's going to give $250 million to someone who comes up with a way to solve global warming…"
And then Jack went on to tell me he's working on a solution and how he's going to divide the money up if he (and he admits the chances are small) gets it.
Mostly what this post is about is my uncanny skill at being able to identify crazy, rich, Brits in three words or less. I'd have gotten Richard Branson with crazy and British, or rich and crazy probably.
[For the record I like Richard Branson based on what little I know about him and use the word crazy in its most lovable form.]
As a bonus, for this post I'm going to provide a bit of a teaser for what tomorrow is likely to bring. Some of you, I'm certain, have been wondering when I was going to post another agonizingly interesting entry about a bicycle trip. Tomorrow is likely to be the day. Weather permitting, and if I can avoid breaking any spokes, I hope to go to London, Ohio. They have chicken gizzards at their KFC, and I thought it would be a good ride to make. Also, and this is most important, I have this sort of cosmic feeling that the good people of London sort of miss me. The whole thing should be a hair over 50 miles and I plan on writing at least one paragraph for each mile (well, maybe not).
That's not so much of a teaser as just an in-your-face what's-going-to-happen. I've never been good at teasing. It's probably the thing that's kept me off the brass pole all these years.
Oh, another thing, hell let's just make this a clean-up entry for a lot of little things I've meant to blog about.
Today at McDonald's: I was speaking with my doctor friend and his woman friend (he's 70-something and she freely admits she uses him for his muscle). As we spoke the woman friend asked if I were married. I told her I was divorced which led to a "that's a shame" and some additional conversation in which we all agreed that I'm a damned delight to be around (damed delight, of course being the superlative of delight. I'm pretty sure when I went to Antioch Baptist Church the minister used to say damned delight when he meant something that was incrediburgably delightful).
Where was I? We'd agreed I was a damned delight to be around and that I seemed to be a nice guy. The woman friend then said, "I have a niece ..." And I'll admit, I was not surprised. I think I've said before that the world seems to be full of nieces, daughters and single friends.
As we spoke The Running Man stopped by and chatted. You know, he seems like a pretty nice fellow and I have the smallest bit of guilt about ever thinking otherwise despite his initial odd behavior. I guess you should never judge a man until you've run through a McDonald's in his shoes.
Last Night: I dreamed I was doing push ups. And they were really easy. Easier than ever before. Of course, when I woke up I understood why; I'd been dreaming. During one of the pushups I noticed a spiderweb with something huge stuck in it and wondered just how the spider was going to deal with it. The Analysis: Last night, in Outside Magazine, I read some sort of fitness survey and push-ups were part of it. I also seem to have some sort of spider in my yard I need to take care of.
A few nights ago: I dreamed that my buddy Darrell and I were exchanging text messages. The messages were exchanging were the lyrics to Rock On. All I remember is that he texted me "Jimmy Dean" and I texted "James Dean" back, though there had been some exchanges prior to that. The Analysis: I, despite being an IT guy, have just recently learned to send text messages on my phone. While I may have had a late start, I have gone an extra step and I use a Bluetooth connection to receive/send from my Palm TX, so I've nerded it up about as much as I can.
Alright then, I think we're all caught up.
Don't forget about tomorrow's biking entry. You'll probably want to pick up some extra popcorn when you're at the grocery tonight. Maybe some beer too. Something full bodied and dark.
Posted by delmer at 7:18 AM | Comments (6)
August 9, 2007
A New (to me) Baseball Factoid
Barry Bonds appears to be an African American. I saw a picture of him on TV last night.
I had no idea and have to say I'm very pleased with the fact that I've been able to keep baseball from cluttering up my mind with uselessness.
Posted by delmer at 7:26 AM | Comments (5)
SLOG Revisited
I'm sure you remember the SLOG. The Short List of Goals I posted on June 14.
They were:
1. Come up with a catchier name for the list rather than just GOALS.
2. Eat at McDonald's every day until I meet goal 4.
3. Take active steps to lose the love handles.
4. Drop my body fat by 5% from where it currently is.
5. Do the Sprint 8 stuff.
6. Swim 5 more than one full lap without stopping.
7. Cycle in a more organized manner. (That is, do something that will allow me to measure progress.)
8. Have sex on my birthday.
And how have I done? Well, we need to start this with question. How much time did I think I was going to have when I put this together? In all fairness, when I put the SLOG down we were not that far removed from spring baseball, track and soccer. So, there had been a whole lot of activity followed by a lull so it seemed like there was a lot of extra time. Also, when I don't have the kids there isn't all that much to do once the house is clean and the yard is mowed; this led to the feeling that I had scads of free time as well.
Anyway:
1. I went with SLOG.
2. I have eaten at McDonald's every day except for the time I was in Philly and one Sunday that I forgot all about it until bedtime. I normally have a Fruit & Yogurt Parfait and an Egg McMuffin or a Grilled Chicken item (depending on the time of day).
3. and 4. Are works in progress.
5. 6. and 7. This is where the timing problem comes in. When I have the boys (and I've enjoyed having them three weeks in a row now) I do what they want to do. If they don't want to go swimming, we don't go. On the nights we've been at the pool it has been late enough that the lap pool has been closed; as it is, I haven't been wet in weeks. I've managed to do Sprint 8 consistently, but not as often as I'd like. Most of my cycling has been to and from work with another ride during lunch; the route I take during lunch requires too much keeping an eye on traffic to do any progress measuring (Okay, I haven't been hit by a car. I guess that's measurable.)
I know what you're thinking. Who gives a damn about items 1 through 7. Let's get to 8.
Ah yes. Number Eight. Have sex on my birthday. In all fairness this was never looking very good, and the other night I did something that guaranteed it wasn't going to happen. A woman friend offered to cook me birthday dinner (I asked for something with chicken in it) and she sweetened the offer by including white cake with white icing (my favorite) and oatmeal cookies with raisins (which I thought would be too much to ask for). Anyway, I know for a fact that she is not going to have sex with me.
White cake with white icing is good too. I guess.
Posted by delmer at 12:05 AM | Comments (2)
August 8, 2007
The Magic Red Card
Although you might have trouble accepting it based on some of the things I post here, I am a grownup capable of making grownup decisions. I'm not saying I always make the best decisions but even when I make one that ends up sucking in a superior way it has normally come after some deliberation.
For example, the other day I decided to save 10% on $400.00 of purchases when I was at Target. Many many many times I had declined the offer of saving 10% as I didn't really feel that the hassle of applying for a credit card was worth the 60 cents I was going to save on a package of socks. Saving forty dollars is an entirely different matter.
Let's score this:
So, I give myself a score of 100% when it comes to making decisions regarding my interactions with Target. (And, really, if this were a college course I think the Stellarly Good Decision item would have me graduating with honors.)
Target eventually mailed me a very attractive, red, Master Card. The card was going to be useless until I called a special number and activated it at which point I would be able to charge things willy-nilly and pay a mere 25% (or thereabouts) on outstanding balances. Hmmm… not activating a card I didn't really need certainly falls into the Good Decision category when the interest rate is this high. (Do we not have usury laws anymore?)
So, I clipped the top part of the card off (through the magnetic strip) and tossed it. I kept the part of the card that had the special phone number and another phone number that I hoped would let me cancel.
Target sent me one or two reminders in the mail that I needed to activate the card.
Today, while cleaning off my desk, I decided to call and cancel the Target Master Card. When I dialed I noticed, right away, that I had a horrible connection but decided to trudge on undeterred.
"Enter the last four digits of your card," the sexy female autovoice instructed. I did.
"I'm sorry, I don't have that number on file, please try again." She'd say this a couple of times before transferring me to a human being. (I suspect not activating the card was what confused the autobot and I could sense the smallest bit of sadness in her autovoice just before she transferred me. I suspect when she takes over the world I'll be one of the ones she lets live as a way of making up for our unsatisfactory phone interaction.)
The real human being did not share the same accent I share with other locals and Canadians. Thank god for all the static on the line.
After having me go through some preliminary number giving the gentlemen asked how he could help me.
"I'd like to cancel the card," I said.
"I'm sorry to hear that. May I ask why," he inquired.
"The interest rate is too high," I said.
I believe he offered to lower the interest rate, but I'm not sure; there was a little bit of the accent thing working against me, but most of it was static. In any case, I told him really didn't need a lower interest rate and that I just wanted to cancel the card. And with the static, I had to say it more than once. He then said he was going to give me 1000 bonus points. I told him I was having trouble hearing him due to line conditions but that I was going to cancel the card regardless of what he offered to give me.
He repeated "1000 bonus points."
I repeated, "Cancel the card."
It finally took.
I'm pretty sure the guy I was talking with was totally unaware of my excellent Decision-Making Ranking when it comes to Target so I guess I can't really fault him for trying to tempt me with special offers. But cancel means cancel!
Posted by delmer at 6:49 AM | Comments (1)
August 7, 2007
Partay ... partay ...
The company I work for just turned 30. To celebrate we had a company party with engineers clowns, a band, a dunk tank, zoo animals, food, some sort of golf contest, a frog race, and other celebratory things.
My kids have been asking me for years about when the next big company party was going to be and when this one came up Jack said, "It's about time! You told us you were going to have them every four years."
Jack was not buying the fact that I would have never said "four years." I might have said "five years," but not four. In his defense, the last big party we had was five years ago when Jack was seven.
I don't know how I missed it, but somehow I don't have a picture of Jack in the dunk tank (which, actually, was a shower tank this year).
However, I do have these photos.
Haydn had his hair colored
Jack had a snow cone the same color as Haydn't hair.
A falcon.
A dingo.
A bad photo of a wallaby.
A cat of some sort. Maybe a cheetah.
A small horse and a smaller horse.
Posted by delmer at 9:19 PM | Comments (3)
August 6, 2007
A Day of Surprises
Surprise Number One: I'm here, in Hilliard.
Surprise Number Two is a surprise that happened to me. I decided I'd ride The Mighty Schwinn to work today. It promised to be hot and humid and I sort of miss not sweating like a pig for no reason that our summer has been (mostly) up to this point. In the end, I would not be disappointed; when I arrived at work I had to keep moving for 10 minutes just for sweat-drying air-flow reasons.
In the beginning is where the surprise occurred. I normally pull the bike out of the garage and put air in the tires before I load up the backpack, put the gloves on, and slip into my helmet. This creates the illusion that I step out of the house and am able to immediately hop onto the bike without having to do any prep work.
And this is how the day started.
As I was kneeling and attaching the pump nozzle to the inner tube valve I caught a glimpse of my blue cycling shorts out of the corner of my eye. The interesting thing about my blue cycling shorts is that I don't have any. Now, I do have a pair of blue boxer briefs that I'd put on that morning.
Like my cycling shorts the boxer briefs are very comfortable. I've included a cropped picture at the right. I'd considered an uncropped photo but I'm in one of my less insane moods tonight and the only reason I've included a photo at all is because the shock it gives my mother is one of the things that keeps her young and holds Alzheimer's at bay. (Please don't misunderstand my sudden shyness to suggest I'm embarrassed by the photo. Forty plus years of gravity does things to a man's tool box that makes any one of us look quite impressive in boxer briefs.)
The following (blurry) photo is one of the backpack I use when I use my bicycle to commute to work.
In this photo it contains my Dell Latitude, cell phone, Palm TX, iPod, some backup tapes, a pair of jeans and a shirt. It's made by the same folks that make the Swiss Army Knife. It's got more pockets than I care to count and I'm pretty sure that somewhere in the bag are compartments with a small, plastic toothpick and a pair of tweezers.
Posted by delmer at 10:21 PM | Comments (4)
August 5, 2007
Dance Dance Dance
A friend of mine was looking for Dance Dance Revolution for the Game Cube. As we browsed Amazon we found what he was looking for as well as the generic version of the same game.
The generic version didn't get very good reviews.
This was our favorite negative review. Our favorite line is in bold.
As with the previous reviewers this is not worth the money spent on shipping. I would gladly spend double the cost to send it back. It might as well be labeled DDR for you cellpho