last vacationer standing

this time last week, i was packing my bags to go on a trip. now, i am home, and all the bags are unpacked & put away. ::sigh:: it's nice to be home, and there are still a couple days of vacation left, but trips away always go too fast. we didn't even really do that much b/c we were visiting elvis & them all. you know... we sat around & watched tv, read books, took naps. we went to goodwill and found some finds. we drove around a bit. took walks. at ice cream. drank coffee. we basically just messed about the neighborhood, and the time just melted away. ::sigh::

we're watching last comic standing, and this guy marcus is rockin' tonight. very, very funny. speaking of rockin', he mentioned he used to be in a rock band, and i am trying to find out what band, and so far no luck w/ that. if you know, tell me, 'k?

yes, i am still on vacation.

still working away at laurie king's touchstone, and one thing that makes it slow going is that it is not first person & keeps changing perspective. it's not totally distracting, but does make for lots of changing gears and contributes to my continually putting the book down.

i might walk to the corner for a cold drink, wearing curlers in my hair. it's west virginia, so i doubt anyone would notice. hur hur hur....

life in a northern town.... i've looked online & believe that song was orginally sung by a british group called the dream academy. so - it would be about life in a town in northern england or in scotland, but it applies to life in a northern town in the good ol' u-s-of-a. this town in w-v where i am currently residing is a northern town. my permanent residence is in a southern town. industry thrives in the north, agronomy in the south. life in southern climes is hotter, slower, and more seasonally rhythmic. life in the north is hurried - folks rushing from indoors to indoors through ice & snow. life in the north is centered around the economy of manufacturing - making things. life in the south is about growing things. northerners are more tech-oriented. southerners are more spiritual, more connected to the earth and the sky.

travel tips for car trips

some things to take on a car trip are obvious, but other things are not. here is a list of some perhaps obvious, and perhaps not-so-obvious, items to take on a car trip:

- snacks, some sweet & some salty, be sure they are all easy-to-eat finger foods, avoid melty things like chocolate
- a pillow & blanket
- box of kleenex
- flashlight, for emergencies
- pen & paper, for writing down points of interest, things you'd like to see again, notes about what you need to do when you get home, etc.
- mobile phone & car charger
- maps, if you don't have maps, you can stop at state welcome centers & pick them up. if you are not going across state lines, you might not need a map
plastic utensils, a couple plastic forks & spoons & a plastic knife b/c you never know when take-out food will not come complete, or you might want to stop at the grocery and get a yogurt or something, and not get a whole box of spoons for one yogurt
- a roll of paper towels, for the types of emergencies that a flashlight cannot solve
- bottled water, or something else you can drink if it is not 100% cold, and that is in a self-sealing bottle instead of a can
- games, mindtrap, trivial pursuit, or other games of cards with questions
- cash, not everyplace you want to stop will accept the ol' check card, especially off-beat fun places like old school diners & teepee hotels
- handi-wipes, for quick clean-ups of faces & hands and also the dashboard, windows, door handles

an additional item if you are staying in hotels: a nightlight. those hotel rooms can be dark with lamps that do an all-or-nothing lighting job. a simple nightlight can really come in handy.

lazy days

adventures in beavisland

so, yesterday i didn't write anything b/c i was mostly driving. we collected maps from kentucky - where there is nothing to see at all, at all - and west virginia - where there is graceland, elvis, priscilla, & beavis. w00t! so far, i am on vacation, and mini-me is working. bwah-hah-hah!

we walked to starbux this morning & picked up litter along the way. good for us walking and good for us picking up litter. we are so goody good good! starts off the day feeling good about oneself. beavis just smiled & had a great time riding along in his stroller.

i am planning to go thrift shopping and also for a jog to the park.

a very busy day.

ha!

solid

just like ol' willie nelson, i am on the road again. mini-me & i took off yesterday -- and, by the way, happy christmas in july! if yesterday was christmas in july, is today boxing day in july? at any rate, we are on the road again. today we ventured to dollywood for a day of funtimes amidst the rednecks. oh, okay... it's not that bad, really. the folks there were all very nice & everyone seemed to be having a good time, relaxing, being with their families, etc & so forth & so on. we rode a couple rides, saw a couple shows, ate a couple foodstuffs that will harden our arteries and rot our tummies, did some shopping, and simply had an all-around solid day. why would we choose to go to d-wood, you ask? oh, b/c that is where ee-bee works. mini-me sort of has a thing for ee-bee. okay, more than a thing, but you don't think i am going to come right out and say they are in love, do you?

tomorrow we will hit the road again in search of the home of elvis. no, not graceland, you ninnie, the home of my elvis. and, priscilla. and, li'l beavis. solid times await! talked to elvis today, and he said that he & priscilla are planning to go on a date and leave us, their visitors, to babysit. oh, really? go out on a date and leave us with the baby, will you?? oh, please, br'er fox, don' thro' me in dat brier patch!!

after d-wood today, mini-me went off to see ee-bee & his band perform. i stopped on the way back to the homeawayfromhome and got vault zero. that is so hard to find these days, i went ahead & got me two. then, i stopped again and bought shrimp & sandwich fixin's. got back here & dumped it all in a sinkful of ice. talked to my old man on the phone for a while, and we had a really solid talk. sometimes folks just need some time on their own, don't you think? then, i spent 20 minutes working out hard in the pool, got 2 fresh cups of coffee from the lobby - with hazelnut creamer, mind you - and returned to the room. hot shower, lots of good food & drink, and now, a wee bit of time telling you what i have been up to. pretty soon now, despite the coffee & vault i will be snoozing it up like a solid rock. when mini-me gets in later, i betcha i don't even hear her.

you know... i still won't say i have a handle on whatall mini-me sees in ee-bee. it's never up to us to see what other folks see in each other, though, is it? i can tell you this for sure - i know what their is to see in mini-me... solid gold. pure & valuable, sweet & sure, to be cherish. solid. gold.

scrabulous, anyone?

still reading laurie king's touchstone. it's slow going, for some reason. it's a good book - i am enjoying it, but it's slow going. odd, that.

ever play scrabulous on facebook? well, the fun may just be over. turns out that hasbro is trying to enforce some sort of trademark or copyright. mattel, which owns scrabble outside the us & canada, has also sent cease & desist orders to facebook for them to pull scrabulous. this would not be happening of scrabulous was not popular. duh to that. and, giving over to scrabble is simply going to lead to having to pay to play the game. i've never played scrabulous, so i don't know how close it is to scrabble, but i am guessing it must be fairly close, but also guessing it could be changed without too much trouble. the creators, however, are not speaking.

in other news, iraqi teams may not compete at the olympics b/c their govt did not reinstate the country's olympic committee in time. the govt officials probably have other things on their minds, but the athletes do not. this is a shame that the country cannot rally around the olympics during this crucial formation time with their new govt.

speaking of sports - time to get ready for the first round of the indoor soccer tourney. w00t! go crappy green team!

running mate jones

in case you didn't hear, hilary's campaign debt was paid. by obama's campaign. kinda makes you think they will end up on the ticket together, eh? as for mccain... it's still up in the air. my old man says he'd like to see lieberman on the ticket, and sure -- that sounds enticing: a mix&match of republican & libertarian. but, don't look for it. that's simply not the kind of thing that happens. i am thinking it will end up being ol' softball-equipment romney, but the media is tossing around all sorts of interesting names. not that i remember any of them. mostly i remember that i had not really heard of a lot of them, which is what makes them interesting to me. i wonder when they will name their running mates, anyway? i mean, the election is coming up in november... let's get some teams on the table, boys! you know what i'd really like to see - name your entire freakin' cabinet before the election. let me choose based on your entire team. that'll never happen, though, b/c the cabinets are filled with paybacks from campaign favors.

got any fig newtons? kinda having a fig newton jones here....

if you have the wrong shoes, even a short walk seems long.

people just looked different in the past, that's all there is to it. the fifties, forties, thirties, and on back. hairstyles, makeup, clothing... all of it put together, well - it's just trappings, but all together, that stuff adds up to making people look different. and, a big factor is hygeine. not simple hygeine like washing your face & hands. more like the complicated hygeine of dermatologists & orthodontists. face shapes & skin tones were bottom-line different.

wish list now includes - bebops. or, saddle shoes. we used to call 'em bebops when i was a kid. there was a time i had to wear them to school. uniforms. yeah - those were the days. it was so much easier to get dressed in the morning. so. much. easier. you can get me the bebops online from payless for $17.99 plus shipping, and shipping is free if they're delivered to the store, which is fine by me. go ahead & get them anytime.

a rubicon is a line which after you have crossed it, there is no going back. sorghum is a grain, grown mostly in the subtropics. and, progress is indoor plumbing.

i am starting a new wish list

and it starts with xylophone.

today i ran... er... jogged 8 miles, went shopping at walmart, did 2 loads of laundry, washed the dishes, installed & deinstalled the stupid showerstuff holder that didn't hold, spent an hour polishing & spit shining the harley - and now might be going out to supper.

what did you do?

why did you keep reading when i told you to stop?

in the locker room, i am not embarrassed to undress & re-dress in front of others. who really cares, eh? nobody is looking at anything but their clothing, trying to get dressed as quickly as possible. the only thing that worries me as we are all busily facing our lockers is that someone will come in & catch a glimpse of me from the back. i mean, what's going on back there? could be a pimple on my butoxie or some such. ick. never can be sure, and it's kind of disconcerting to think what might be up with the downside.

when i run, i wear a garmin forerunner. it keeps track of the time & distance, so i can go where ever i want & know how far it is. the velcro band on the forerunner gets very sweaty. stop reading now if you are squeamish. i am warning you, stop. now. sometimes i like to smell the velcro band. see, i told you to stop reading. and, no, i really have no idea why i do that.

not sure how i feel about it.

she said to me - you look like a girl in the movies.

i said - oh, yeah? who?

i can't remember. - she said.

julia roberts? - i suggested.

no.

sandra bullock? - i hoped.

no. that boxer girl. - she remembered.

oh. - i said, disappointed. hilary swank.

yes! - she concluded. that's it: hilary swank.

what about ol' kenny perry, eh?

kenny perry has won 3 tournaments in the last 5 weeks. or, something like that. yeah, golfing - pga golfing. you with me? right. so, he is 47 years old, has been on tour for many years, has won 12 tournaments in all, 3 of those in the past 5 weeks. so, he has a quarter of his wins quite recently. he is from kentucky, and that is where the ryder cup will be played this year, so he wants to be picked, so he is working hard on winning. good for him. that's what i say. good for him.

we just watched 2 hours of last comic standing in 20 minutes. that is how much excess blather is on that show. they spend so much time chattering & judging & having crazy competitions that they leave very little time for actual comedy. two weeks in a row, iliza shlesinger has ended up in the challenge. i don't know how that happened b/c of course, we skip the blather. but, i am a big fan of li'l iliza.

i have perused the list of starbux stores that are closing, and i would like to reassure you that none near myself are closing. i know you were worried about my cinnamon dolce latte supply.

my dad doesn't have a nose ring!

have you ever seen the last airbender? well, i have. b/c mini-me watches it. apparently, mini-me is very much into it. i am more like skirting around the edges of it. dipping my toe in. finding it tepid. speaking of tepid, my old man is all wonky. seems he wanted to go out to eat, but me & the mini-one had already eaten. hrm... so, we were not on the same page. speaking of pages, i sat in a mtg today in which the phrase on the same page figured largely. as in, we were not all on the same page. some of us didn't have pages at all. sheezle. i get tired of wasting time in these fiascos. the project manager didn't have a plan, and we sat down to talk to the consultant on the speakerphone. no plan. no agenda. no scope, expectations, deliverables. nothing. if you cannot see the problem with this, you could apparently get a job as project manager at my place of business. i really wonder how mtgs operate when i am not there. how does anything ever get done? speaking of done, i think the laundry & coffee both are done, so it's time for me to go get some of one & fold some of the other.

let's learn something: air pressure

okay, air pressure. turns out it's very important in forecasting the weather. you know how the hippy-dippy weatherman just comes out there & blathers about the weather? turns out, they can predict what the weather might be. who knew? probably they are keeping this a secret, since they don't want other people horning in on their collective gig. this is why they tell you it's going to rain and then it doesn't rain -- they know it is not going to rain, but they tell you it is going to rain... see, they want us to think the weather is a mystery, so that they can keep their jobs.

okay, air pressure. high pressure is clear weather; low pressure is storms. there are always high areas & low areas all over the world, and air is moving constantly between the high & low areas. moving air... wind... duh. so, pressure & wind are the two big factors in weather prediction.

air pressure is measured with a barometer, from greek words for weight & measure. here is a picture of a barometer. nice, huh?

current barometric pressure: 30.11 inches

6º?

tonight's the season premier of the closer and saving grace. w00t! i am hoping that ol' grace will be interesting. she'd slipped into sloppy soap opera at the end of last season. too many loves, too little time. whatevs. ya-hawn! it was better when they were exploring the supernatural aspects of the angel-human relationship. yes, much better. the closer was fairly solid all season, so that's the one i am really looking forward to. maybe we will make some popcorn. it's gonna be a blowout par-tay!

starring in the closer is kyra sedgwick. know who she is married to? kevin bacon. she is, like, the least degrees separation you can be from kevin bacon without being ol' kev himself.

monday, monday....

'tis monday - time to begin again. cowgirl up!

thought for the day: a person could go through their entire life without knowing how to tie shoes, tell time, or make change.

one of my faves. hope you like it.

by edgar a. guest

Somebody said that it couldn't be done,
But he with a chuckle replied
That "maybe it couldn't," but he would be one
Who wouldn't say so till he'd tried.
So he buckled right in with the trace of a grin
On his face. If he worried he hid it.
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
That couldn't be done, and he did it.

Somebody scoffed: "Oh, you'll never do that;
At least no one ever has done it";
But he took off his coat and he took off his hat,
And the first thing we knew he'd begun it.
With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,
Without any doubting or quiddit,
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
That couldn't be done, and he did it.

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,
There are thousands to prophesy failure;
There are thousands to point out to you, one by one,
The dangers that wait to assail you.
But just buckle in with a bit of a grin,
Just take off your coat and go to it;
Just start to sing as you tackle the thing
That "cannot be done," and you'll do it.

but, it's a dry heat.

someone i work with pronounces words... uh... creatively. i will provide a small sampling, and you see if you can guess what these words are. i will spell them as pronounced:
-- spineglayss
-- veesta
if you guessed spanglish & vista, you would be correct. see? creative.

we stopped at best buy tonight for mini-me to exchange her brokdee mp3 player for one that is not brokdee. they were very cool about it & exchanged it even though it was the screen that was brokdee, and the screen is not supposed to be covered. so, bonus points for best buy.

while we were there, my old man picked up a cd. he & i don't always have precisely similar musical tastes, so i am not always thrilled when he gets a cd. ho-hum, whatevs. well, what did he get? - you ask. oh, he got... jakob dylan!! w00t!! yeah, he got a cd for me me me me meeeeee!! he's the best, eh? yeah.

well, class, as you know, we have been studying barometric pressure. you have been given an assignment to put the daily barometric pressure in context by providing information on local & worldwide average barometric pressure. have you done your homework? uh-huh... right. excuses will no longer be accepted! do your work! okay - to inspire you further, here is a visual aid. this picture shows a bottle that was closed at approx 2000 m altitude and was crushed by the pressure when it returned to sea level. as you can see, air pressure is potentially deadly. i bet you wish you had done your homework now, don't you?

if you brought your partici-pants, pull 'em on!

best semi-curse word: wanker

best vincent: tie - vincent d'onofrio & vincent vaughn

best streetlight fuel: sodium vapor

best worm: nematode

best description of liberalism: politics of grievance

most likely to clean the house: my old man [w00t!!]

best housing material: logs

best description of stupid-talk: sounds like your mouth is falling down the stairs

best traffic flow engineering design: the jug-handle

most misunderstood traffic flow engineering design: the jug-handle

best summer camp: brigadoon

best amusement ride: the sky-ride

best instrument: bagpipes

best next entry in this list: yours! ...whatta ya got?

books 2008

currently:
touchstone
laurie r. king

completed:
irish tiger
[andrew greeley]
the bishop at the lake
[andrew greeley]
break no bones
[kathy reichs]
cross bones
[kathy reichs]
fatal voyage
[kathy reichs]
monday mourning
[kathy reichs]
bare bones
[kathy reichs]
grave secrets
[kathy reichs]
cause celeb
[helen fielding]
death du jour
[kathy reichs]
déjà dead
[kathy reichs]
playing for pizza
[john grisham]
the big over easy
[jasper fford]
the life all around me by ellen foster
[kaye gibbons]
the name of the wind
[patrick rothfuss]
eat, pray, love
[elizabeth gilbert]

he said - she said

girl: i am concerned that if i don't work out, i will gain weight.
guy: on the days you don't work out, eat less.
girl: but, i am hungry.
guy: eat proportionally more protein to carbs. protein is more filling.

----------

girl-1: i am concerned that if i don't work out, i will gain weight.
girl-2: no way - you look super! let's get ice cream.

this is my opinion

my favorite yogurt now comes in a smaller container. same price, smaller container. i would rather they had raised the price b/c i would rather have 8 oz of yogurt.

current barometric pressure: 30.01 inches. did you do that research i assigned you to put the pressure in context? i didn't think so. you have totally let me down. i'm crying now. really, i am.

get smart, wankers

went to see get smart yestereve with mini-me & my old man, and it receives three thumbs up. we were all laughing aloud, many times, as were most of the folks in the theatre. you did not have to even see a single episode of the original show to laff a lot. and, good to see commercial boy get a good part. commercial boy used to be on a life cereal commershal, and then he showed up on many other commershals, and then he got a part on studio 60, and then studio 60 was stupidly cancelled by stupid network executives who are stupid. thus, it is good to see commercial boy get a good part. his real name is nate torrence, and he is a funny dude. there is a show on ppv right now called get smart's bruce & lloyd something something except the last part is not actually something-something, it is just that i cannot remember what it actually says, but now, having seen the movie in the theatre, i realize that the ppv movie is probably fairly highlarryous. i might watch it. wanna come over?

so, i get the mag popular mechanics, by subscription, and when i started getting it, my old man was like - why do you get that mag? but guess who grabs it first now? yeah, what a wanker. at any rate, this month's issue has an exploration of immunization. there is a growing population of folks who wish not to have their children immunized, for a variety of reasons. some think that immunizations cause autism, as did i, but this appears not to be true. some believe that diseases like polio are no longer in existence, meaning they don't need immunizations, but the truth is that polio & other wanker germs are hanging around all the time, and it is only the mass immunization that keeps them at bay. there's nothing for them to latch onto, so they just mingle amongst themselves. they are not actually gone anywhere, see? it's the community immunization that forms a wall to keep them out, but the wankers that decide they don't need immunizations are taxing the community, requiring the community to provide them protection they will not provide for themselves. other community germ protectives, like the cleaning of drinking water, are done behind the scenes by myriad minions, and we need not worry our pretty little heads over them. but, society as we know it relies on our getting immunized. don't be a wanker, protect against canker.

nay aug??

yesterday on the front page of aol.com, i saw a news story about an abraham lincoln statue that is missing from nay aug park. today, while looking for pix of treehouses, i saw on the first page of google results, a treehouse from nay aug park. twice, in two days, i have heard about a park in scranton, pa., that i formerly did not even know existed. what the hula kinda name is nay aug, anyway? sounds like the noise that donkeys make. go research it & report back. yes, you. go!

Established in 1896, Nay Aug Park is the cornerstone of Scranton, PA's commitment to nature, family and historic preservation.

rain? what rain?

the 4th at brigadoon was spectacular, as usual. thank you for asking. talked to the brigadirector, and lo & behold, she might want us actually there next yr for an extended stay. we shall see how that works out over the coming months.

have you ever heard of rain.... uh.... rain.... what? of course you have heard of rain. what the hula was i going to say about rain? i have no idea b/c i was in the middle of writing that thought like, over two hours ago, when i jumped up in mid-thought, changed clothes, and ran from the house yellin' & wavin' my arms. no, the house was not on fire, silly. i would not have stopped to change clothes if the house was on fie-yah.

why then, you ask, did i leap, change, & run? b/c my old man going to set someone's dvr across town to record the nascar race, and he was like - i am leaving on the harley in 2 mins - if you want to go, get ready. you do not have to tell me twice, nosirree!

so, whatever it was i was going to say about rain just got lost in the shuffle.

current barometric pressure: 29.98 inches. it's about time for some context on this barometric pressure deal, don't you think? yeah. like - what is the avg bp in various areas of the world, and how does it relate to the weather in those places? yes, it is time for context. you go do some research & report back here. go. go!

greetings from brigadoon

where the wasps are wack.

uh... gotta go... sheezle!!!!

the setting of the starbux star

starbux is closing over 500 shops and laying off hundreds of workers. why? they have mismanaged their business model. yeah, blame it on the economy if you want, but starbux did this to themselves - it would have happened anyway, no matter what the economy is doing. why? back to the biz model. starbux began as a cultish thing in seattle. it was a local coffee shop that made really good coffee & printed a pic of a half nekkid girl on the cups. they did well, so they opened another shop. and, another. and, a few more. the coffee was still good, and the concept caught on - pay a premium for premium coffee. starbux was not something you could get everywhere. it was exclusive, rare.

seemed like everyone was catching on to the concept, so the ol' buxsters kept on making new shops. the more shops they made, the more sense it made to systematize things. baristas became robotic extensions of corporate. all the shops looked the same. what was once special & unique became rote & common. hail, there are starbux in target stores. when something is readily available, we are no longer willing to pay a premium for it. there is a fine line between meeting supply & causing over-saturation.

as more & more stores were built, more baristas had to be trained to correctly work the equipment. specifically, the espresso machines were complex & difficult to work correctly, so all the manual espresso makers were replaced with automatic ones. the coffee lover's nemesis - the automatic espresso machine.

what was rare became overly abundant. what was unique became systematized. what was tasty became mechanical. what was special became rote.

kkd & kids today

krispy kreme donuts stock was trading at $50/share 3 years ago, but the carb bubble burst, and it's been below $10/share ever since then, bottoming out at $2.50. a mysterious company is offering to buy it out at $7.25. it is currently trading about $2 below that, so there is some talk about why would this company want ol' kkd at higher than the going price. kkd expanded nationwide just before the great protein craze labeled donuts as a supreme evil - kkd was weakened by the expansion and could not effectivey withstand the anti-carbites. but, ol' kkd is hanging in there.

i once ate 24 donuts at a sitting. i do not believe they were kkd, b/c it was at brigadoon. brigadoon is good for many, many things, but name-brand pastries is not one of them. they now have better-than-kkd pastries on sundays, but back in the day, we were happy with cold, generic glazers. seriously, they were cold, but who really cared? seriously, seriously, kids are totally spoiled these days. a cold donut for breakfast & a tiny carton of ice cream w/ a wooden spoon for dessert at lunch were huge, giant treats on sundays. that's right - a flat, wooden spoon. yes. wooden spoon. kids today would refuse to even entertain the notion of eating such things.

current barometric pressure: 30.04 inches.