Don’t Tell Me What’s Wrong With Me….I already Know

Are You Ready for the Zombie Apocalypse?

2012-01-20T11:14:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year some friends and I were driving through the canyon on MT 191 to head up to Big Sky. My g/f was sacked out in the front seat as we had to get up super early to make our flights and we’d already been traveling all day.

While winding through the canyon I made a comment about if something ever happened and things went south really fast Montana is one of the places I’d probably head to. This led one of my friends and I into a conversation about shooting and hunting. I was surprised to learn that he knew how to hunt and skin a deer – I just didn’t picture him as someone that would have ever done that.

I figured MT is a good place to go because there aren’t that many people, you can hide out in the woods, there is plenty to hunt, and while it’s cold this can actually be an advantage. Think about it. Have you ever seen a zombie movie in a really cold place? I think it’s because zombies don’t like cold weather. Besides, with the reduced population in MT you wouldn’t have to take as many of them out as you would in some heavily populated area, like L.A.

Naturally you need to have some weapons. This is a picture of one of my friend’s weapons cache (or as he says a picture of part of his weapons cache):

Note the two shotguns – everyone knows these are good for killing zombies, but there is also a carbine, a sniper rifle, and various other knives, swords, etc. All good for hunting and killing your food, zombies, or disillusioned people.

I’m covered on shotguns, rifles, and pistols, but I apparently lack a plethora of swords and knives. I always figure that they shouldn’t ever get that close anyway.

But another friend of mine had a different strategy. His strategy is to hijack a semi full of Hostes Twinkies and live off of that for the rest of his life. I asked him how he would defend his Twinkies and while I was never sure, it seemed that he was either going to hide them, or use a gun. I’m not sure this is the greatest strategy for survival, but it’s interesting. I later found out that the shelf life of a Twinkie is really only a few days (25 seems to be max) and that this wouldn’t work at all.

Where Have All my Friends Gone?

2012-01-14T10:38:00.002-07:00

I guess it’s inevitable that as we grow older and become more involved with our own lives, family and careers that we tend to distance ourselves from those not immediately involved within the nucleus of those pursuits.

I don’t drink much anymore so on the weekend I try to go out and treat myself to a few beers and some bad food. Actually, I like good food, but it may not be good for me. Last night I went up to have a little Mexican food and a beer or two. I was sitting there by myself and thought that while I am used to this due to all of my traveling why am I sitting here by myself when I am home? Where have all my friends gone?

Now, I have friend and acquaintances all over the country. I obviously can’t go hang out with them unless one of us is willing to hop a plane and spend some scratch traveling. That isn’t going to happen on short notice, and certainly not just to go have a beer or two on Friday night.

So what about the others?

One of my friends and I get together for lunch about once a month. He’s married, has kids, and runs his own business. That pretty much means he’s off the grid and can’t just go hang out.

Another friend of mine has recently gone off the deep end. He thinks I am sleeping with his wife and am conspiring with her to hack his computers, have him followed, and am otherwise generally out to get him. You can imagine that he probably doesn’t want to go hang out and have a beer with me.

Another guy I know has moved further away, bought a house, gotten married, and started a good career for himself. He also has to work odd and mostly late hours, so he’s pretty much unavailable for a weekend beer and due to the distance it makes it even harder to get together.

One of my former drinking buddies is so pussy whipped and entangled in a bad and abusive marriage that his wife won’t let him out of her site long enough to go have a beer anywhere. She and I don’t get along so I pretty much don’t see him anymore.

One of my friends and his wife have gotten really busy with their careers and with other extracurricular activities that take up a lot of their time. Also, due to their hobby I suspect that they are more likely to focus on hanging out with folks that are into the same hobby, which I am not. I am not upset by this, but I do miss seeing them.

Another friend and his wife don’t go out on the weekends, but we do manage to get together on most Thursdays for dinner. I do enjoy that when I can make it, but we can’t always put it together. Of course, I don’t drink during the week so…..

Then there is a guy that is married, has kids, etc. As with most people that have a family he just can’t get together that often. He also moved a little further away and we just haven’t been speaking as much.

I have a friend that lives fairly far away and has a pretty hectic schedule. It’s very difficult to get his time for anything. We’ve been trying to get together with his wife and my g/f for months. Hasn’t happened.

And my g/f lives about 40 miles away. This has its advantages and disadvantages. When you want to hang out and have a beer or get a bite to eat it’s a disadvantage, especially when either of you have worked all day or you are tired. The last thing you want to do is kill yourself driving a couple of hours in traffic. I usually see her on the weekend, but that doesn’t mean that we spend all of our time together.

As for the others? There are people whom I would go have a beer with, and I would consider friends, but it’s not like we would normally hang out all the time anyway.

So, I enjoyed my two beers and my paella by myself while watching the usual bar-scene folks.

Small Home Project

2011-12-14T20:03:00.001-07:00

Here are a couple of picture of a recent home project in which I mounted two guitar wall hangers to the wall. They are Hercules Hangers and you can pick them up for around $20 ea.
The hangers weren’t hard to install, but I suggest that if you can’t get a stud on the wall that you put in molly bolts, which I did. They seem to hold my guitars nicely and free up some floor space. I’ll probably buy a third one and also put it on the wall.

I needed a new stand to accommodate a new bass which I just got. I had wanted a bass for a while, but had just never gotten around to buying one. It wasn’t something I needed. I just wanted to be able to fill in some parts here and there when doing recordings.

As it turns out I had a TON of rewards points on my credit card. Surprisingly enough, they had a lot of musical equipment on there and when I was surfing around I found this bass. It’s a Schecter Omen Extreme 5-String Bass. I burned about ½ of my points, but it didn’t cost me a dime otherwise!!

I’m also glad I got the 5-string. I’m not a bass player and that is painfully evident when I play it, but I have really been making a lot of use out of the low B string. My fingers are mad at me right now as they are pretty sore from jamming on it for the last 2 days straight in a row. They’ll toughen up, but it will take a while.

Tooth Owie – I’m a Stud!

2011-12-14T20:01:00.001-07:00

Or rather, I now have a stud. I finally got my implant put in this morning. While we didn’t plan on it my father, me, and my sister all had surgery this morning. I had my implant put in. My sister had a bone graft done on her jaw – so she could later get an implant, and my dad outdid us all by having a defibrillator & pacemaker combination put in.

I think I had the easiest time as it only took my surgeon about 30 minutes to do the procedure. It wasn’t painful, but there was a lot of pressure. I could actually feel the pressure difference in my skull when he put the implant in, and hearing them drill into my skull was a bit odd. You could “hear” it everywhere at once.

The doc offered to either put a temporary screw into the implant, in which case my gums would grow over it and they’d have to numb me up and cut me open again to get to it…..or I could have the little stud put in and they wouldn’t have to numb me up again. I’m not that vain so I went with option 2.

My sister apparently doesn’t do quite as well with dentists and what-not so they put her out for her ordeal, but I also understand that it’s a lot more invasive. Last I heard she was doing OK and resting up.

My dad also did just fine. When I went to see him at the hospital he was alert and seemed to be in a good mood. Other than him wearing a gown and having an incision just under his left collar bone you might not realize he just had surgery.

If you read the blog, you might recall that this started back in July!! Now I just have to wait about three months before I can get a new crown.

Giving Back to the Kiddies!

2011-12-05T19:06:00.001-07:00

I’ve had a pretty good year financially. Sure, I’ve had some other issues this year, such as being diagnosed with diabetes, but I can’t complain financially. I’ve had a little extra money come in from natural gas revenue, and I’ve made a lot of money working my ass off all over the place.

If you are kid, stop reading this right now or you are going to be sorely disappointed…..

Now it’s that time of year to give back. I was recently reading an article on the post office secret Santa’s. When little kids write to Santa Clause the post office intercepts the mail and goes through it. The ones that are the obvious, standard, write to Santa letters are more or less discarded, but the ones that are clearly hard luck cases in need of help are pulled out and set aside. You can then volunteer to pick up a few of the letters and get the stuff for the kiddies. I wasn’t really aware of this program, but I typically do an Angel Tree, and participate in a toy run. Some years, I am unable to participate due to my schedule and I always feel terrible. But I was reading that article and it just killed me. It always kills me. I just can’t stand hearing about kids that need clothes and food and stuff.

When you are a little kid you are supposed to be asking Santa for a new bike, or Barbie, or baseball glove, or a bb gun or something. You’re not supposed to be asking for a new pair of jeans or some shoes because your parents can’t afford them this year. No kid should have to go through that. Think about it. You can ask for anything in the world, it’s Santa after all, and you are going through such hard times that you don’t even ask for toys. I can’t take it…seriously, practically tearing up just writing this.

So I go down to the Angel Tree and pick a few kids off the tree and try to get them what they need, plus a little extra so they can have some semblance of a Christmas. This year I grabbed a couple of kids off the tree – well not really the kids. They don’t stick the kids on a Christmas tree, that would be uncomfortable for the little bastards – and went off to do some shopping for them.

One of the kids is named Jose. He’s 12 and needs some jeans and stuff. I was at Target trying to find jeans in his size – a size 18, and I got really confused. Kids clothes are like chick clothes. They have sizes, not true measurements, and I couldn’t find anything that was a size 18. Everything at Target went up to a size 16 “husky” – why they don’t call it “chunky” I don’t know. I went around to the Adult isle just to make sure I wasn’t smoking crack, but think about how tiny someone would have to be to have an 18” waist. Nope, that wasn’t it. Apparently Jose is a fat bastard.

Being the resourceful person that I am I call my g/f up since she is near a computer and ask her if she can find some translation of kids size 18 to an adult size. I was thinking I just wasn’t getting it. But apparently there isn’t a translation. I guess one day you just stop buying kids clothes and start buying adult clothes. I’m not really sure how that works.

Anyway, so I explain my dilemma and ask her to help out. Naturally I tell her I luck out, and got a fat bastard, am having problems, and can she help? While she is looking the stuff up she says something to the effect of “why do they call them husky and not fat?” and I reply back “because it’s politically correct to say ‘my kid is husky’ and it’s not politically correct to say ‘my kid’s a fat bastard.’” Little did I know I was speaking more loudly than I should have and some mom overheard this. She was not pleased. I think she would have stabbed me to death or caused some other bodily harm if she could have gotten away with it. She turned around and huffed and puffed her way out of the department. I told my g/f this as I was laughing. We both agreed that her kid must also be a fat bastard.
I have to go to Old Navy tomorrow, because apparently they carry fat bastard clothes for little kids and Target only carry’s semi-fat bastard clothes for little kids. At least Jose will have some clothes he can wear and I got him an MP3 player and stuff, too.

The Salvation Army is doing the Angel Tree through Dec. 12th. Last day to “adopt” is the 11th and you have to have your stuff in on the 12th. If you can find the time, and a few extra bucks, please go down and help out. Some kid, fat or not, will really appreciate it and you’ll make their day!

Dean Markley Customer Service

2011-12-03T10:01:00.000-07:00

Nope…this is not a rant about Dean Markley. Rather the opposite. I’ve played guitar longer than I care to admit. – over 20 years. I should be a lot better than I am, but I suck. I still play, but I think it’s some kind of self-torture at this point. I keep thinking I’ll get better, but I still suck.

Anyway, throughout the years I’ve tried a various types of strings, but my favorite and the one I always buy when I need new strings for my electric is Dean Markley Blue Steel. They carry a premium over the other strings, but I really like the way they play and sound.

The last two times I changed strings on my guitars I had at least one string that was bad. How can you tell that a string is bad? Well, if it’s not obvious when you pull it out of the package your intonation will be way off. Basically, intonation is the ability of the guitar to stay in tune anywhere on the neck. This is not a big deal, you just have to identify the bad string and replace it. However, when you are paying a slight premium for strings and have to open another set just to get one string it can be frustrating.

I wrote Dean Markley, explained what happened, and basically asked how this happens and wanted to let them know it was frustrating me. Not only did they write back and explain what might be causing it (defective batch), but offered to send me a few free sets. Now that is how customer service should be! Thanks Dean Markley!!

Assholes Get the Chicks

2011-12-03T09:53:00.001-07:00

Anyone that has known me for any length of time has heard this before. I’d say it’s a long standing belief of mine, but it’s not a belief, it’s a fact. I recently picked up a Kindle Touch – the $99 one that comes with the ads. I’m too much of a cheap bastard to spring for the extra $30 and get the one without ads. I’m on the road (again) and using it to read my second e-book with it. The first thing I read was a novella by Stephen King. I keep meaning to do a quick write up on it, but I am not home and I am also still getting used to it, but so far I really like it.

But all of that is not the point. The second book I bought, and am about to finish, is called “I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell” by Tucker Max. I think they may have even made a movie about it. I wanted to read the book for a while, but it’s still in the $20 range at the book store, and I’m a cheap bastard. E-book version? $5.00… hey! This e-book thing isn’t so bad after all!! But, I digress… Anyway, so I pick the book up and start reading it. I didn’t realize this guy had a web site (still not sure of the name, but I am sure a Google will bring it up). He’s pretty intelligent, obtained a law degree, and comes from a wealthy family…and he’s a complete dick to women. And, he gets more pussy than just about anyone I’ve ever heard of except for major celebrities. Assuming that everything he writes is true I can’t believe he gets away with it, but reading the book just drives home the point that nice guys finish last. Let that be a lesson to you. Now, though, I think he is beyond the Tipping Point, and chicks sleep with him because he’s the “thing to do.” If you don’t know what the Tipping Point is, go read about it. It’s a book by Malcom Gladwell. Also an excellent book.

But seriously, the book is great. He writes well, it’s an easy read, and it’s highly entertaining. I found myself practically choking on the airplane as I was trying to keep myself from laughing out loud. It’s also mostly excerpts from his blog so the stories are fairly short and broken down into quick chapters – you can pick it up, read for just a few minutes, and put it back down without forgetting where you were in the book.

If you like reading about wild, crazy, drunken debauchery then this is the book for you…..

Working on the Axe…

2011-11-28T08:23:00.001-07:00

It’s funny, sometimes, how little things that we plan on
doing completely change as the day progresses. Take, for instance, playing my
guitar. I’ve hardly touched my guitars in two months. Not hard to do when you
are away for so long. Sure, I’ve thought about getting one of those really cool
“backpacker” guitars to take with me on road trips, but I really don’t need
that one extra item to take on a plane and have to lug around.

But, since I was home for a nice, long, holiday weekend I
thought I’d get some guitar time in. A few times during the week I pulled out
my newer JP6 and played it a bit, but found it difficult to get right into it.
I think that is mostly due to my fingers and hands not quite being in shape.
Also, the strings were shot and needed to be replaced.

I replaced my strings a couple of days ago, but nobody
wanted to come and jam. No biggie. I had planned on getting in some practice
time today and throughout the course of the day found all kinds of other chores
that needed taking care of. As it turns out, I finally sat down at my computer
to jam a bit (yes, I use my computer since I have a Line 6 UX8) and ended up
downloading all kinds of driver updates and software updates for the UX8. While
that was going on I also updated the drivers on my Harmony One remote (a very
kick-ass remote).

It also didn’t help that my secondary monitor went on the
fritz and I had to order a new one to replace it. It’s not here, yet, so I have
one monitor with an HDMI connected to my laptop, and the VGA connected to my
media computer and I have to manually switch it back and forth. Big PITA.
This was killing my motivation to jam, but it needed to be
done.

Then I decided to go get some plastic plates so that I could
bring my plants in from the colder weather. I figured I needed to get to the
hardware store before it closed. On the way there I stopped by Best Buy to
check out the e-readers. Specifically, I wanted to get my hands on a Kindle
Touch and a Nook. After checking them both out for quite a while I ended up
picking up a Kindle Touch. I’ll try to write a review on it a bit later….
And then I made it to the hardware store. On the way home I had to get some
food. Done. Back to the house, but now I had food to eat…. So I fire up NetFlix
to watch a flick while I eat, and I plugged my new kindle in to charge up.

So here it is, 8:00ish or so at night and I still haven’t
jammed. No problem. I come in to the computer and fire everything up and cross
connect it to my iPod so I can play along with some stuff. Before I get the
iPod fired up I start dicking around with my intonation. Don’t ask me why, but
for some reason I noticed it was just slightly off and before you know it I
spent about an hour and a half tweaking my intonation and string height setup.

If you don’t play guitar that won’t make much sense to you,
but believe it or not there is a really interesting balance of the string
height to the neck, the tension on the strings, the placement of the bridge,
etc. etc. On an electric with a floating tremolo system, such as my JP6 it’s a
delicate balance of all the working parts. Tweak one little thing, and it
throws the whole guitar out of whack.

It probably took me a solid year to get my Les Paul tweaked
so that it is “just right” for me, and it’s a significantly less complicated
guitar from a mechanical perspective. This is my second or third go-around on
this one, but it already plays even better than it did when it was brand new –
and that’s not an easy feat considering that it was set up great from the
factory.
But, finally, I jammed on it….and jammed, and jammed, and jammed…. Until my
hands are tired, I couldn’t pick properly anymore and my fingertips are already
sore. It was good, though! I got back to some of my older metal roots, almost
learned a new song, and warmed up my chops.

The point was to emphasize how you can start off intending
to do one thing, and end up doing a bunch of different things. I still got the
things I wanted to get done completed, and then some, but there were a bunch of
other things that gone done in between….
Now, what was I saying?

Thanksgiving Gluttony!

2011-11-28T08:20:00.004-07:00

I’ve often heard of people gaining weight over the holidays.
Apparently it’s not that unusual when you consider that an average Thanksgiving
Day meal packs a whopping 5000 – 6000 calories!!!! Add that to a little extra
snacking, a few extra beverages, and an entire weekend of eating “hearty” and
it’s not surprising that people put on a few pounds.

This weekend, I also splurged a bit. My morning started off
normal enough with a slice of PB&J toast. About 11:00am I split a protein
shake (with banana and peanut butter in it) with my g/f to tide me over until
our feast.

For my feast I had no appetizers, despite my niece begging
me to try this or that. All of the munchies were some kind of bready
something-or-another. She has a hard time understanding why I won’t eat stuff
like that, but my mom, who is also diabetic, will. I tried to explain that if I
was going to eat something with a lot of bread in it, I would rather have
stuffing than some crackers or something.

But, for my feast I had a salad, some ham, some green beans,
and a little home-made macaroni and cheese. I even split a piece of pumpkin pie
and whip cream with my g/f. I also had a two glasses of wine, about three rum
balls, and when we started playing cards I had a glass of good whiskey.

Aside from normal eating I also allowed myself to have a
beer and a glass of whiskey on Friday, and Saturday. Saturday night I even went
down to a good Mexican place and ate a plate full of nachos (with the beer),
which I am really not supposed to do.

All in all, a little excess for me, but nothing too crazy.
And then I weighed myself on the scale this morning…. Surprisingly, I still
lost weight!!!

I’m now down to 130.2 pounds. All my friends keep telling me
I am getting really skinny. A few people have commented that I am “wasting away”
and one friend has actually asked if I am OK. I can’t say that the thought hasn’t
crossed my mind about not being OK, but I also figure with all the blood work I’ve
done I would hope that they would be checking markers for cancer.

I still think most of it is attributed to diet, though I
also hit a workout program pretty hard for the first month or so. Not so much
the last two months – I find it particularly difficult to work out on the road
when I am working 14 hour days and stuff, and I’m just not a morning person.

No, I think it’s mostly diet. I’ve made a huge effort to cut
out all the sugar in my diet, and that is not easy to do. Even before being
diagnosed with diabetes I was aware of how much sugar we consume as Americans.
Trust me, it’s in pretty much everything, and if you don’t believe me try
reading some labels. Still, knowing that it’s there and trying to eliminate it
are two totally different things. But I do a pretty good job and I don’t
consume a whole lot of sugar or simple carbohydrates.

So how much have I lost? Well, I keep a chart going back to
early 2005 of my weight. In 2005 I weighed 158 pounds. In 2007 I was up to
about 167 pounds. Somewhere in there I was also hitting the gym a lot and there
is no doubt that some of the weight was attributed to muscle mass. Then,
somewhere around 2008 I started to lose weight again. I think it’s because I
stopped lifting weights and started losing muscle mass, but I was also a bit
more conscientious about the spare tire around my middle.

In march of this year I was surprised to be under 160 again –
and didn’t realize it until we went skydiving for my 40th and I
thought their scale was weighing in light. By July I was down to 153 lbs. In
august, under 150, and by September I was under 140. Now it’s almost December and
I am about to be under 130!!!! Heck, if I take a good crap I can be under 130 before the day is out!

I honestly can’t remember the last time I weighed under 130.
I think it was somewhere around high school or college. A long time ago…..

Is there a point to all this? I’m not sure. Just that I
thought I would have gained a few pounds over the Thanksgiving Day weekend, but
I didn’t. I think I managed to enjoy myself, without denying myself everything,
and still ate reasonable.

Unless there really is something wrong with me, and I
suppose it’s possible, just about anyone should be able to lose a few pounds by
controlling their diet better. Mind you, I don’t starve myself at all. I eat
three to four times a day, maybe more, and I have some snacks. If I can do it,
you can too!

Job Offers and Work

2011-11-05T09:10:00.001-07:00

The other day a good friend of mine sent me an email he received regarding a possible position in Fort Worth, TX. In his email he said that it would mean that I probably wouldn’t have to travel anymore. Good point. On the other hand, I kind of like to travel. That doesn’t mean I like being stuck on the road for weeks on end like I am doing, now. But, I do enjoy traveling around a bit. I get to see some pretty interesting places and meet all kinds of people. I go skiing in the winter, and when it’s 108 back home in the summer I get to go to cooler places. It also makes for a cheap vacation when I take my g/f and aside from her flights and meals everything else is paid for. Nice.
But the big reasons I have to think real hard about those jobs?

Well, first off, I have a TON of flexibility in my work. When I am home my commute is about 120 feet. I don’t fight rush-hour traffic and I don’t spend my life listening to talk radio while stuck in traffic. I work in my boxers during the summer, or my fuzzy PJ’s during the winter. If I need to go to the mall during the day I do it. If I want to go have lunch with a friend of mine? No problem. Go play golf with my old man because I’ve been too busy to see him much lately? Again, usually not a problem. I just have to make sure I am getting my work done and I am otherwise left alone. Try that at Corporate X.

Secondly, I don’t do the same thing every day. None of the:
Get up at the same time
Sit in traffic
Go to the same office
With the same boss (I’ve seen my boss 2 or 3 times in the last five years).
And the same employees
And the same problems
And the same network
Work my 60 hours without overtime.
Go home
Eat dinner
Go to bed
Get up at the same time
Etc., etc. etc.

Every week to me is something new. It’s new people, it’s a new project, it’s a new opportunity to fail or succeed, a new opportunity to learn and better myself. Mostly, it’s not the same 9-to-5 grind bullshit day in and day out and I love it. I’m not even sure I can go back to a 9-to-5 grind job right now. That would be very difficult.

And last, but not least, when you read into the job descriptions you will always see something that reads very similar to “…. maintain the network 24x7 ….” What you should be reading is that they are going to strap a pager or smart phone to your ass and that you will be on call 24 x 7 and get woke up at all hours of the night and have to work weekends. Fuck that. I’ve done it. I’ve put my time in and I have no desire to go back to doing it again.

My boss says that the reality is that I am already on call 24 x 7, and that is true to an extent. I would never turn a client down that called me in the middle of the night. But, they don’t call me. They call the poor sap that is the network administrator and wake his ass up in the middle of the night because if they call me it’s going to cost them out the waazoo. The number of times I have been woken up in the middle of the night to help a customer? I can count them on one hand. So it’s really not the same and someone would have to pay me buckets of cash to take on that role and responsibility again.

SPAM and Telemarketers

2011-11-05T09:09:00.003-07:00

The other day I was in a bar and these two chicks were talking about how much spam they are getting. They also talked about how every time they get spam they always click on unsubscribe, etc. They are also on Facebook and several other social networking sites. Then, about a week ago I overheard one of the IT guys talking to another guy about one of their users. The user had a smart-phone and had two pages of social networking apps loaded onto it…and they were having all kinds of problems, including being inundated with SPAM.

So here is bRad’s handy tip of the day:
If you are subscribed to Facebook, Twitter, Linked In, MySpace, or any number of other social networking sites, and you are getting a lot of SPAM then shut the fuck up! All of those sites are notorious for selling and distributing your information. Heck – YOU are notorious for posting everything you do in your life on all of them so that it gets plastered all over the internet. Secondly, if you are one of those people that subscribe to those sites and you also complain about your privacy and rights – again, shut the fuck up. They are all also notorious for having terrible privacy policies and it’s well-known. So don’t whine to me about it.

Now here is my other tip with regards to SPAM – if it’s a legitimate business site, such as Target, and you recently placed an order and suddenly you are getting offers from them it’s probably OK to click on the unsubscribe link. Most of the time, that works. But, if it’s Bob’s House of Sex Toys and they are trying to sell you some Viagra, a tube of Sex Lube, a cattle prod, and a coupon for two hours of time with Belinda the Dominatrix Midget then don’t click on the unsubscribe link. In fact, don’t click on anything! They aren’t going to unsubscribe you and by clicking on the link you just verified they have a good email address.

Now about those telemarketers – there are some federal laws and guidelines that telemarketers have to abide by. Go look them up and read them. Don’t pass around the latest bullshit anti-telemarketing email that some goofball wrote at 2:38 am in their mom’s basement.

For the most part, you can politely, but sternly, tell these people to not call you and take you off their list. If they do it again, they are subject to a fine and a lawsuit, but if you don’t follow up on it it’s your fault.

Next – don’t answer the phone. If the phone rings while you are about to stuff those peas into your face and you see “unlisted” or a number you don’t recognize don’t freaking answer the phone. Let it go to VM or your answering machine if you haven’t been lucky enough to get out from under your rock.

Stop signing up for those stupid “You can Win this Corvette” things at the mall. You can’t win so forget it. Yes, they have to give one away by law, but they also just got ALL of your information along with a million other people and what do you think they do with it? They sell it. That’s how they make their money. So if it’s worth it to have a 1-in-a-100-million chance at the Chrysler Minivan, and be subject to 500 calls a day by someone in another country by all means, sign up.

Last? Change your phone number. It’s not that hard. And it’s not that hard to give it out to those people you want to have it. I love my parents, but I go over to their house and their phone rings no less than 5 times an hour while I am over there – all of it is telemarketers. They’ve had the same number since Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone and the entire world has it. You probably have it and don’t even know it. So what do they do? They use their cell phones and just let the phone ring and ring and ring. Not sure how they do it because it would drive me crazy.

Meh…

2011-11-05T09:09:00.001-07:00

I received a few emails and comments that I need to update my blog. One of my friends specifically referred to me as a “loser.” For not updating it, I suppose, but then again I have several friends that call me a loser from time to time. Why are they my friends? Sometimes I wonder…..

But lately, I just haven’t much in the way of drive or motivation. I thought I might be slightly depressed, and I suppose it is still possible. I asked my doc if the meds I am now taking cause any depression and he said it wasn’t a known side effect. However, he did say that if my blood sugar was too low that could cause me to not feel like doing a whole lot.

I don’t believe I updated my blog, but the last time I had my blood work done my A1C and non-fasting glucose test were below normal….even for someone that is not diabetic. That’s good, but we needed to tweak my meds again.

But, back to not being motivated. It’s kind of hard to explain because, as I said, I don’t feel particularly depressed. In my head, I am still writing on the blog, still writing music, etc., but I just don’t have the motivation to actually get up and do anything about it. Hence, why the blog hasn’t been getting updated very often.

I haven’t hardly touched my guitars in the last month or so….and it doesn’t help that I have spent most of that time on the road for work, which is exactly where I am right now. I’m in a little town called Sandy, Utah. It’s about 12 miles south of Salt Lake City and we just got a good dusting of snow. Perhaps I should rephrase that. It’s a “dusting” for areas that get snow. Back home in Texas it would probably shut the state down. Ahh….soon it will be time to break out the snowboard, get it waxed, and pack up for some snowboarding!!!

I’m sure I’ll overcome this lack of motivation, but it could take some time. It doesn’t appear to be going away quickly and perhaps I am just freaking tired – I was on the road for I don’t know how long, and am now on a four-week-straight road trip. I get home for Thanksgiving, and then leave again for another trip. That’s too much. The other night I literally was disoriented when I woke up in the middle of the night. I didn’t know where I was, the layout of the room, or even what town I was in. Sad.

Tooth Owie – Still Cont.

2011-11-05T09:08:00.000-07:00

My gums and everything feel like they are all healed up, but I need to have an x-ray taken to see if the bone has healed up enough. I was supposed to go about a week or so back, but I’ve been on the road and have had to push it off until the week of Thanksgiving. Hopefully the x-ray will look good and I can get my implant in, soon!!

Tooth Owie - Cont.

2011-09-18T19:34:00.005-07:00

Today I went to have my tooth pulled out and an implant put in. Like most people, I really don’t like dentists and having needles and things stuck in my mouth. Today was no different and I told the surgeon that I was pretty nervous. I have to say, though, he was great. I can’t speak for his surgical ability, but his bedside manner, personality, and willingness to talk to me and keep me up to speed on what was going on was awesome!

He got my tooth out in about 20 minutes. Unfortunately the root on my tooth is slightly large and it left a larger hole in my skull than he would like to have seen so he couldn’t put the implant in today. Instead he did a bone graft and stitched me up. Now I have to wait about 8 weeks for that to heal up before he goes back in and puts the implant in. Then, I’m looking at another three months before I get a crown put on. Not happy, but at least I made some progress on it. On the positive side, I’ll probably be able to put together a good “crack addict” Halloween costume or something.

The photos show the progression of healing. The first photo was the day after it was done. The second one is about 5 days later. You can see my stitches are starting to dissolve and come out.

Vacation – Costa Rica

2011-09-18T19:34:00.004-07:00

I just got home from a second trip to Costa Rica. We had a great time and for once we didn’t get too caught up in trying to do a ton of things. I think I slept and dozed most of the first day. We spent a lot of time hanging out by the pool or on the beach. Our house was kind of odd, but the main level of the house was open, like a tree house, which was really cool. Since it was built up on the side of a hill we got a great view and breeze off the ocean and monkeys would routinely come into the house looking for food or just to steal our stuff.

I also tried to learn to surf. I did OK, but it’s far more difficult than it looks when you are just learning. Mostly it’s exhausting fighting the waves to get out there and then trying to time the wave just right so that you catch it. I was pretty wiped out, but had fun and even caught a couple of waves here and there.

It Ain’t Cancer – Part 5

2011-09-18T19:33:00.000-07:00

On August 29th I went in to talk to the doc and have some blood work done. We had a good conversation, and I told the doc that my stomach was still pretty upset from the medications. I also told him that at some point I’d like to be able to have an occasional cola, slice of cake, etc. He said that he thought that might be a possibility, but we would have to get things under control first. That is certainly understandable.

My labs came back and I was pretty disappointed with them. My blood glucose level was 143 (down from 229) and my A1C was 8 (down from 11.4). The good news is that they were both down, but it was disheartening that they were not better. In some ways, I felt like everything I was doing wasn’t good enough. The reality is that it’s a little bit of everything and it takes some time to get everything tweaked right. We decided to change my meds to something that wouldn’t upset my stomach so much and to add a new medication to help improve my insulin production.

I started my new meds the day before I went on vacation to Costa Rica. I could immediately tell a difference in my body chemistry and sure enough I had a mild hypoglycemic condition that day as I waited too long to have lunch.

I can’t help but be mildly depressed over the whole situation. It could be worse and in some cases I feel like a big pussy. Still, I want to get it under control. I want to be able to have seemingly “normal’ life without having to constantly be on extreme guard with regards to what I eat. When I was in Costa Rica it was a little difficult to find foods to eat. Remember that while I can eat some fruit, I can’t just scarf down on it like everyone else. I also can’t drink as much or snack on things like chips and cookies. A staple of Costa Rican diet is rice – which is also not that good for me. Combine all that together while you are on vacation and it’s a little depressing. We even went on some cruises and to bars where they had free rum-based drinks with fruit juice and I couldn’t have any of it. Rats. At least I had my first solid poo in over a couple of months. I know that may not sound like much, and is probably too much information, but it was a big deal to me.

So I am on my new meds, and I’m still paying attention to my diet. My workout routine has been interrupted by a number of things – got sick, went on vacation, had dental surgery, etc. – but I’m still working on that as well. My current weight hovers around 141lbs, give or take a pound or two on a day-to-day basis.

It Ain’t Cancer – Part 4

2011-08-04T16:31:00.000-07:00

I’ve been struggling with my recent diagnosis of diabetes. I never ate too poorly, but I loved my Dr. Pepper in the morning. I don’t drink coffee or tea, so my morning DP is how I get my caffeine and get going. It’s also an enormous amount of sugar so I had to cut them out. Unfortunately that was my caffeine source and I have just never been able to stomach diet drinks. Lately I’ve tried Diet Dr. Pepper, Diet Coke, Coke Zero and Diet A&W Root Beer. I’m not sure that I understand the point of diet A&W as it doesn’t have any caffeine in it anyway and it doesn’t taste good enough to drink otherwise. Ick.

This pretty much made the first full-on week of meds, diet and no caffeine hell. I had absolutely NO energy, which is counter-intuitive to what I thought I should be feeling. That is, if my glucose levels are elevated because my cells can’t burn the energy and I start taking meds to allow my cells to take in the glucose and burn it, I would have thought that I’d have had a little more energy. It was so bad I couldn’t concentrate and I could literally have laid down in the isle at Home Depot and napped and I wouldn’t have cared that people were walking by me. I had trouble driving home one evening.

From Energy Fiend:
Top 10 Caffeine Withdrawal Symptoms

1. Headache- A caffeine headache usually starts behind the eyes and then moves up the front of the head.

2. Sleepiness- This just isn’t your normal tiredness, this is sitting up straight but still can’t keep your eyes open tiredness.

3. Irritability- Everyone and everything gets on your last nerve. It’s best just to lock yourself in your room during this stage.

4. Lethargy- Forget about productivity at this stage because you’ll be unmotivated to do anything.

5. Constipation- Caffeine stimulates the bowel, so without its daily does the colon gets a little cranky too.

6. Depression- Caffeine withdrawal can take away all hope for living. Temporary blues are one thing, but if you already struggle with depression this could be a big issue.

7. Muscle Pain/Stiffness- If you normally have some caffeine prior to exercise then during caffeine withdrawal you could feel as though your muscles have weights strapped to them.

8. Lack of Concentration- Forget school, studying, brain surgery, or jet engine repair during this stage of withdrawal.

9. Flu-like symptoms- Stuffy nose, blocked sinuses and even vomiting have been reported by people withdrawing from caffeine.

10. Insomnia- Some people are strange and actually can’t sleep when going through caffeine withdrawal.

I pretty much exhibited all of these, except for the headache and constipation. If anything, my bowels are irritated by the medication and I have to go more than I’d like.

Things seem to be getting better, which makes me think that I am getting over the caffeine withdrawals. However, today was a bit difficult as I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t sleep. I’ve been drowsy and tired all day. It’s also harder for me to get out of bed in the morning. I used to wake up and just be ready to go – even before I’d grab my morning DP. Now it’s a struggle to get moving and make myself breakfast sans caffeine.

I keep telling myself things will get better as my meds and body get more dialed in. As one of my friends told me “it took a while to get it out of whack, it will take a while to straighten it out.”

It Ain't Cancer - Part 3

2011-07-22T08:45:00.001-07:00

I saw my doc yesterday and we had a pretty good conversation. When I had gone in for my physical my blood pressure was up a bit, but yesterday it was back to normal – 120 over 80. Almost textbook perfect.

I asked the nurse for a copy of my lab results from the previous test as I still didn’t know what my readings were for glucose, etc. She got me a copy of them and I had plenty of time to review them before the doc came in. It was not a good sign.

For starters, they had run an A1C test. I didn’t know they ran that one, and I was going to request it. An A1C test is a measurement of your hemoglobin and it’s relation to blood sugar (glucose). It’s not a direct measurement of your glucose but of your bloods ability to carry glucose. A normal reading is less than 5.7. Anything between 5.7 and 6.4 is increased risk of diabetes and anything over 7 is diabetes. Mine was 11.4!!!!

Also, my glucose level was 213 – it’s supposed to be under 105. And, they had found glucose in my urine. There isn’t supposed to be any in your urine.

The doc was real nice, but the bottom line is that even with a severe infection it shouldn’t elevate your glucose numbers to that extent and the A1C test wouldn’t have been affected by it. I still asked for another round of tests just to be sure, and prior to starting treatment. The doc agreed, but unless there is some bizarre fluke it certainly looks like I have diabetes.

So….the good news. The doc said I’m not as bad off as it seems, though I will need to start treatment as soon as the next round of tests are confirmed. As he put it, he has fat-bastards coming in with glucose levels well above 300 or 400. He said he even had guy that ran marathons that developed diabetes. That guy got lucky because he came in because he was urinating all the time (sign of diabetes). They tested his glucose level and it was almost 700!! He had a race to run in a week. Doc said if he had ran the race he probably would have died due to dehydration. Lucky guy.

The doc also thinks I am producing insulin – which means that my cell receptors are probably having problems. This is controllable via oral medication, diet and exercise. Unless my body is unresponsive to all the types of oral medication I shouldn’t have to take insulin. At least I don’t have to lose 200lbs or something and the doc is putting me in his handful of “skinny diabetics” category. I wouldn’t say I am skinny, but I’m not huge – I weighed in at 153.4lbs fully dressed @ 5’6”.

So what does all that mean? Well, it means I am going to have to watch my diet, exercise, take pills, and get stuck by needles every 3~6 mos. for the rest of my life. As long as I respond positively to the medication it shouldn’t be that bad.

As for diet - I don’t eat huge gluttonous meals too often, but I will have to curb starches and carbohydrates a little bit, which will be a bit difficult for me since I love pasta, rice, Asian and Italian foods, etc. I’ll have to stop eating chips for a snack and switch over to low-fat popcorn. I eat popcorn as a snack, but now I’ll have to eat more of it. Less on the fruit, more on the veggies, and anything with fiber is good. The Dr. Pepper is going to be really hard for me, though. I don’t drink coffee, but I like my morning DP to get me going. I need to try diet again, but I’ve never liked diet drinks – can’t stand the artificial sweeteners, but maybe I’ll grow to like one of them. And I can still have a drink with my friends, but I can’t get hammered.

It’s still a bit frightening because diabetes increases your risk for heart disease and other cardiovascular issues as well as an increased risk for all kinds of other health problems. Fortunately, and again, if you can get it under control those risks all drop to the same levels as people without the disease. Right now, I am in the paranoid stage (and perhaps still shock and denial) and every minor feeling of numbness or twitching muscle puts me on edge (all signs of nerve damage, or no problem at all!).

It also profoundly reminds me of my mortality. I never liked the idea of taking pills or medication to fix things. I always see “old” people as people having to take a bunch of pills every day, and that in itself can be problematic. Some people get to taking so many pills they actually cause more problems that they fix. Despite trying to take care of myself and staying in some semblance of shape I get to join that club.
It makes me wonder, though, if even 50 years ago a lot of people probably died from complications related to diabetes, but were often diagnosed with something else.

Right now, the first step is to confirm the diagnosis and then get things under control. We’ll see what happens after that.

It Ain't Cancer - Part 2

2011-07-21T08:06:00.001-07:00

I’ve been doing a lot of research on diabetes. Last weekend, I relaxed a bit and did some more research on the internet. I discovered a few things that I thought were pretty important:

First, I learned that that elevated glucose levels were typically a sign of infection. I read multiple articles indicating that events such as stress, infection, and dental problems in particular will cause you to have elevated glucose levels. I also read there was some correlation of antibiotics and glucose levels, but since you typically are fighting an infection it is not unusual to be on antibiotics. In other words, there may be some correlation, but it isn’t a direct correlation. Well, I had just started treatment for an abscess (dental AND infection). I also had just had a root canal and was pretty stressed out about the whole ordeal (I hate dentists). Even after my tooth broke almost a week after my physical the x-rays showed that the abscess was almost gone, which means I still had it to some extent.

I also read up on things that cause elevated liver enzymes. While it’s true that diabetes and other problems cause elevated liver enzymes so does acetaminophen, ibuprofen, and narcotics. I was taking all three, including triple doses of ibuprofen within 24-48 hours of the test. I still couldn’t find out how long it takes your body to recover and expel all of that from your system, but I would suspect that 48 hours would be the starting point.

And everything I have read up on testing for diabetes indicates you need to have at least two tests with similar results before confirming a diagnosis. I only had one, and now I seriously question the validity of that particular test. I know I said it earlier, but I am now even more convinced that the test needs to be re-done as well as some additional testing, such as the A1C test (thanks mom!).

None of this means that I don’t have diabetes, but it does mean that we (the doc and I) need to re-evaluate the diagnosis before moving forward.

It Ain’t Cancer

2011-07-13T15:15:00.002-07:00

Today, just after getting all the news about having to have surgery to fix my tooth I get call from my doc. I had a physical last week along with some lab work. They called to tell me I had diabetes and that I needed to come in and discuss treatment. It’s hard to explain exactly how I felt then as I was pretty much in shock and my mind was blank. I can’t say I’m doing much better now, either.

I’m going to ask that the test be re-done. I find it hard to believe that my diet and / or lifestyle directly led to it, but it’s entirely possible that I was predisposed to it due to genetics. Since I am adopted, I’ll never know for sure. I also think that the stress of having all the dental work done as well as the cocktail of drugs I have been on may have had some effect, though I could be mistaken.

I feel like I am being kicked in the teeth.

MF Tooth Fairy! Part 1

2011-07-13T15:11:00.002-07:00

Right before the July 4th holiday weekend I was in Oakland, CA working on a project for an ice cream manufacturer. Not a bad gig as the weather is pretty nice in Oakland. It stays within five degrees of seventy more days out of the year than all but about one or two other cities in the U.S. So while it was a sweltering 100+ back in Texas, I was enjoying the “heat wave” of 70’s to 80’s.

Right before I came home I had a pretty severe pain in my upper teeth. It wasn’t any one tooth in particular and nothing I did seemed to make it any worse or better. It hurt pretty bad at the time, but there wasn’t much I could do about it. When I woke up the next morning it was gone. I finished up my gig and flew home. My pain returned once, but it never lasted very long. Heading into the holiday weekend it continued to happen more frequently and more intensely. I was pretty much screwed since it was the weekend and a holiday weekend at that. By Sunday it was hurting all the time and by Monday (the 4th) it was hurting so bad that I bummed some pain killers from a friend of mine just to get me through – it was either that or go to the ER as I was in so much pain I couldn’t concentrate anymore. After the drugs kicked in, it took the edge off but I wasn’t in that good of shape. The pain had also localized to one tooth in particular – my left maxillary lateral incisor, also affectionately known as #10.

I got a list of “in network” dentists from the insurance company and my g/f was kind enough to call them and find one that could work me in on Tuesday with very short notice. I appreciated that as I was apparently whacked out on hydrocodone and not functioning very well – she said I was listing to the side as I came back to bed and I wasn’t making a whole lot of sense. Even though I said I would get up and call the dentist she took it upon herself to do so.

The dentist took some x-rays and politely told me I was screwed. I had an abscess that was just forming up in my skull. My #10 had apparently suffered too much trauma at some point – probably after having a crown put on it years ago – and died. When the tooth dies it ceases to maintain good blood flow and an infection had somehow gotten in there and started having a party. He gave me a prescription for pain killers and antibiotics. He was dead on the money when he said the antibiotics would make me feel better after they kicked in due to getting rid of the infection. I immediately started a cocktail of lortab, a triple dose of ibuprofen, and antibiotics. I think I heard my liver scream somewhere in the background.

I called the endodontist and setup an appointment for a root canal the very next day. Now, I’ve heard all kinds of horror stories about root canals so I wasn’t too pleased with this, but an abscess can actually enter your brain through your sinus cavities and kill you so I wasn’t going to dick around with it.

I know a lot of people hate going to the dentist, but I gotta tell you that there is a good chance I’ve had more dental work done than a lot of people. I have gotten to where I really, really, really don’t like dentist and someone poking around in my choppers. I was pretty nervous going in to get the root canal but they were super nice and other than getting shot with anesthetic it wasn’t too bad. He gave me a little topical anesthetic, which doesn’t really do shit except make you think it won’t quite hurt as bad. Then they pry your jaws open and come at you with the syringe. As they are shooting the anesthetic in you, you can really feel it start to hurt. Not fun and it was hurting more and more as he kept putting more in. Then he says he wants to get the other side and that “it might pinch a bit.” Oh really? “You mean worse than that?” I asked him sarcastically. He didn’t get it and asked if I was ready. Um, yeah…let’s get it over with.

After he numbed me up they put some kind of funky tooth condom over the tooth to keep blood and saliva out of the area while they operated. They also stuck a piece of rubber in between my teeth to hold my jaw open at an angle I couldn’t otherwise naturally achieve. Between the two, I couldn’t have been more comfortable.

Once all the prep work was done it went pretty fast – maybe 20 minutes? It was a little odd to have them sticking tools up in my head and pulling out tissue (nerves) and wiping them off on a little napkin in front of me. But once it was all over I came home, took some more pain meds and crashed out for a bit.

Upon waking up I really wasn’t in any real pain, but I was a tad sore. I stopped the pain killers, but kept taking the ibuprofen through the next day. They had packed some medicine up in the now hollow root canal and told me to come back in two weeks to get it taken out.

Well, today, almost a week to the day, I was eating lunch and my tooth broke off at the gum-line. It didn’t hurt, but it was a bit uncomfortable. I didn’t bite into anything, it just broke off. I stopped eating just in case there was a chance of me getting food or something up in there, but it was a bit strange.

This photo shows my tooth - at least the part of it that broke off. The outer-most part is actually a crown. The darker interior part is what is left of my original tooth, which apparently died. The very white middle part is the medicine that they packed in during the root canal.

My dentist got me in right away and again took an x-ray and told me I was screwed, but worse this time. Because the tooth broke off so close to the bone they said they couldn’t get a post or another crown on it. I was supposed to fly out of town tomorrow, but I had to re-schedule so the lab could get my temporary to me. That way, I can go out of town on a gig for work with something covering the hole in my gums and teeth. I’ll also use it later on when I have to wait for the implant to heal. Oh yes. Implant. That’s right – they are going to cut me open to remove what is left of my tooth and then put a titanium implant in my skull. If I am lucky, my bone will be in good shape after they pull the tooth and they can put the implant in right away. If I am not lucky (which at this point I am leaning towards not gambling) they will have to do a bone graft, let it heal, then cut me open again to put the implant in. After all that, I get to have post sticking out of my gums for about 3 months while it all heals up, and then they can put a crown on it.

And it’s not cheap. Total cost? About $5,000 of which I’ll be out of pocket about $3,000. My insurance isn’t that bad, but all of this is maxing it out for the year and they don’t cover the temporary tooth at all. Keep in mind that my insurance already paid for a root canal, a dental visit, and a bunch of x-rays and drugs and all that. I guess I am lucky as I could be out a lot more and while I am very unhappy about the turn of events I keep telling myself “it ain’t cancer.”

But still….why couldn’t I just have a cavity?

Do you have kids?

2011-07-13T15:08:00.002-07:00

I often get a mixture of responses when I tell people that “yes, I am 40 and I don’t have any kids” (that I know about).

The most common response by someone that has kids is bewilderment, as if they can’t fathom the concept of *not* having kids, or why anyone in their right mind wouldn’t have children. I’m not sure if it’s because they are envious or if they really just don’t understand the concept of not being a breeder.

Which brings me to the second most common response – again by those who have kids – envy. You can see that glassy eyed look in their eye. They are thinking about all the times that they couldn’t go out and do something because they had kids. They are thinking about the 1976 Les Paul that their five-year-old destroyed. They are thinking about what they could really do with that money that is going towards a college education for someone that tells them to fuck off every day.

Occasionally I get the high-five by someone that either never wanted kids, either, or by someone who has kids, but never really wanted them. They did it because they weren’t very lucky (i.e. read responsible), or because it was the right thing to do if you wanted to be “normal” in society. You know, 2.5 kids, a white picket fence and mini-van (hey man, soccer moms / MILFS are hot!).

And the last response I get is one of understanding that while that person may not agree with my lifestyle they recognize that people are different.

But no, I just never wanted them. I don’t hate kids. In fact, I often have a blast when I go play with all my other friends’ kids. We get into trouble and we have fun. And after I get them really wound up, I go home and have a beer. I’m a selfish bastard – I have my toys and my time. If I want to go out, I go out. I don’t worry about having a babysitter and I don’t worry that my guitars are sitting out.

I once heard that you know you are ready for kids when you don’t feel like going out anymore. I’m not there yet, and don’t think I’ll ever be.

You can Have Lapband, Now!

2011-06-18T19:57:00.000-07:00

Or…you could just put the Twinkie down, get off the couch, and eat a reasonable diet.

Sunburned Head

2011-06-18T19:56:00.001-07:00

I try to be careful with my head and not get sunburned. Often my friends argue with me:

Friend – you are sunburned
Me – no, I am not. Just a tad pink. It will be tan by morning.
Friend – no, you are sunburned.
Me – no, I am not.
Friend – Yes you are
Me - *sigh*

And that is pretty typical when I am not sunburned. But, this time. I’m sunburned. It was one of those days when it wasn’t hot out at all. In fact, most of the time it was quite cool and a jacket might have been nice. I was aware of the sun, but couldn’t do much about it. I don’t wear hats, and I couldn’t find any sunscreen. By the time I found a do-rag, it was too late.

Oakland Cabbie Slobs

2011-06-18T19:54:00.000-07:00

Does this look like a guy that wants to earn your money?

Sorry for the poor photo, but I was trying to be inconspicuous. This is an Oakland cabbie. He’s not that unusually dressed. They ALL dress like complete slobs. WTF?

Riding Hot

2011-06-06T13:10:00.001-07:00

I haven’t gotten to do much riding lately, and to be honest, I seem to come up with excuses. Time is a big factor, and of course I can’t carry much on the bike. It’s also gotten to be summer time in Texas which means it’s hot. Not your Northern “my pussy hurts because it’s 80” outside crap either. 99+ pretty much every day.

I also don’t ride without gear on, so it’s a lot of effort to put on all my crap just to go to lunch and be completely soaked in sweat. Still, I wanted to ride so I took the bike to my g/f’s house Friday afternoon. Now, it’s not an exciting ride slabing it down the highway, but it’s still nice being on the bike….or is it?

Well, I wasn’t 10 miles from my house and I got hung up in construction traffic, 4:00pm traffic AND two wrecks….. I finally got through all that and hauled ass for a few minutes before I hit downtown Dallas. Normally, I jump on the HOV and I’m gone….but there was another wreck on the HOV so it was closed. How in the hell do you have a wreck on the HOV? It’s one lane, all moving in the same direction with almost NO onramps. Morons. To top it off, there was another wreck or so on the main highway. So I was stuck in first and second gear almost the entire way…in all my gear…when it was 99 out…and idling down the highway. Soaked in sweat, not happy, but something keeps me riding…..

Recent Vacation

2011-06-06T12:46:00.002-07:00

I recently got back from a vacation in Tennessee and North Carolina. My g/f had to go out that way for business, and I had to go to Minneapolis for training. She drove, I flew. First order of the day was trying to pack for both weeks. The first week was to be spent in MN where it was still cold and snowing. The second week was to be spent on vacation where it was sunny and mostly warm, and where I’d be doing some camping! Because I didn’t want to take a bunch of suitcases I balanced my clothing as best I could between the two and gave my g/f all of my camping gear to take with her.

I’ve been to Minneapolis a few times, but this time I stayed out of the downtown area. Not much going on except that I really noticed a lot more shopping malls than I ever have. My g/f says there are just as many in Dallas, but I am not so sure about that. I think there isn’t much to do up there in the winter except shop so there are a ton of malls. Those people are certainly trying to support the economy!

After my training I flew into Knoxville to meet my g/f. She was just wrapping up here business there and we spent the night in Gatlinburg. I had never been there before and it was a bit of an odd experience. Nestled in the foothills of the Smoky Mountains it looks like a miniature Las Vegas complete with a bunch of Neon signs and small wedding chapels everywhere. Apparently Gatlinburg is the second most common place to get married. The other thing they have there is mini-golf and pancake houses. It’s a bit surreal with all the neon, wedding chapels, mini-golf, pancake houses, and tourist shops. What I never really figured out is why it is such a famous destination spot. In some ways it reminded me of Paris Hilton who has no real talent and has never done anything to deserve being famous…..other than she’s famous.

We spent the next week driving mountain roads, checking out small towns, and just generally enjoying being away from Texas and not having to work. Everyone was very friendly, but we did notice that there are a lot of dry counties and you often had to go out of your way to even find a beer to have with dinner. I did get lucky, though, and found a liquor store that carries George T. Stagg. Stagg is a most excellent whiskey, but I pretty much can’t get it in Texas due to availability. I bought a couple of bottles of it to bring home. It should last a while seeing as how it’s over 140 proof and fairly expensive…mix it with coke in my house and we’ll have to have words.

The other thing we noticed about driving around out that way is that everyone gives pretty horrible directions. We’d be in small towns that have perhaps six or seven roads and people could not tell you how to get to the grocery store accurately. Mind you, these aren’t six or seven city roads and that makes it a bit more difficult, but still…. People would look right at an intersection and tell you to go right and after five miles you realize they were wrong and you should have gone left.

Mostly though, it’s green. REAL green. Trees, vines, flowers, and other forms of vegetation grown naturally all over the place. I’ve been in NC before and it’s one of the things I always liked about it. You could be 100 yards away from a Wal-Mart and not even be able to see it through all the trees! Because of all the hills and mountains you pretty much have to drive slowly and wind your way around to get anywhere. Always plan on it taking longer than you think because you’ll be in the twisties before you know and reducing your speed down to about 30mph. Due to this fact, it is a mecca for motorcycles and we saw a TON of them out there. I really wanted to have my bike, but it just didn’t work out for this trip. Nonetheless, we went to check out The Tail of The Dragon since I had never seen it. The Dragon is often acknowledged as the most famous motorcycle road in the entire U.S. People travel from all over to ride the 11 miles and 318 curves. As I said, I didn’t have my bike but we did manage to have a good run at it in my g/f’s mini cooper – that car sticks like glue! Unfortunately, as often happens on this road, there was a pretty bad motorcycle accident in which a couple of Harley baggers had gotten tangled up and both of them ended up in a ditch (one on top of the other) and a guy was hurt pretty bad.

We stopped at the lodge, had a beer and some fries, and bought a couple of souvenirs. I was reluctant to buy anything that said “rode the dragon” or “dragon slayer” on it as I didn’t really get to ride the dragon. We also checked out the Tree Of Shame which my g/f thought was pretty interesting.

We spent a few days camping while we were in the area. The first night we camped was in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Not a bad place to camp, but the campgrounds were pretty typical – a winding road through a slew of parking spaces with enough space for a tent and firebox. We managed to grab a spot by the river despite showing up late due to trying to find a grocery store and some wine for the evening (see above with regards to bad directions and dry counties). We never did get a fire going very well, which I attributed to some green wood that we picked up. It smoked a lot, but that was about it. One guy had a freaking huge fire and I jokingly suggested that we go sit with him. Even after it started raining his fire was still going strong. Bastard.

The next time we camped it was at Mt. Mitchell State Park. The park is not very large, but it is the highest peak east of the Mississippi at roughly 6,700 feet. The campgrounds are not “typical.” There is a parking lot and then you hike up a fairly easy trail to get to the camp spots which are spread out and fairly secluded. It’s not that you couldn’t see your neighbor, but you did have to make an effort to do so. This was nice as it gave you the feeling of being in the middle of nowhere.

It’s worth noting that up there you are in black bear country. The park ranger even warned us to cover up our suitcases as the bears had learned to recognize “cooler-like shapes” and would tear into the car to get to them. I had never heard of this, but we took his warning to heart. He also said to put everything that had a scent, including toothpaste and chap stick, in the bear-box at the camp site!!! This is a bit of a double-edge sword. Put it in the bear box and it might attract bears to your camp site, but put it in the car and they might break into the car and tear it to pieces. We elected to go with the bear box, but this also lead to us being completely paranoid at any little noise outside the tent during the night. It didn’t help that we had the rain-fly on the tent to help keep the tent a little warmer and the breeze would blow it around and you couldn’t ever tell if what you were hearing was a huge bear outside the tent, or the rain-fly brushing the ground a little bit. I never had a thermometer, but it got fairly chilly about 4:00am. I was guessing in the 40’s to low 50’s. Fortunately my sleeping bag is fairly well insulated and I was OK as long as I had some jammies on.

The second night we stayed there I asked the park ranger what the forecast was for the evening and he said there was a thunderstorm watch in effect until about 11:00pm. Sometime during the night, that obviously changed into a thunderstorm warning and it hit us about 11:30pm. It’s one thing to experience a thunderstorm at ground-level when the storm is above you. It’s entirely different to be at over 6000 feet and IN the thunderstorm. This was the second time I had been in one, but the first time I tried to camp through one. It was pretty intense. The lightning was so bright it was blinding even with your eyes closed and the thunder would ricochet off all of the mountain peaks. Very cool, and very frightening. The rain and wind would pound the tent and then it would lightning and thunder. You could hear the wind coming from a long way off, building speed and intensity. It would start as a little roar, then build into a whisper, then it would keep building into a shriek and just when you thought it would rip the tent right off the ridge it would shift and go off in a different direction. It was the most bizarre thing. Dolby Digital has nothing on this. Due to the side of the ridgeline we were on we didn’t get hit with the really bad winds even though there was a time or two when we weren’t sure if the tent was going to make it, but it did just fine. One guy, on the other side of the ridge said that it pulled half his tent off the ground and ripped up four of his tent-stakes. He had to curl up in a ball and ride it out until the storm died down enough for him to run outside and re-stake the tent. During all of this, I was thinking “at least we are dry and it’s not hailing.” I had already decided that if it hailed we’d have to make a run for it. There were two storms that night and while the first was the most intense the second one lasted much longer. Needless to say, I didn’t get much sleep!

When we woke up in the morning we learned that a bear had broken into someone’s new mini-van and ate all their food. We went down to check out the car and talked to them for a bit. They were nice, and were obviously not happy as the bear tore things up pretty good. It busted out a side-window on the back and crawled in. They said it got everything – a few pounds of hamburger meat, a couple of pounds of peanuts, some peanut butter, etc. Pretty much everything a little black bear would love. They had even been so nice as to crack the windows so the scent would escape and the bear could get its claws in and pull the window out. How nice of them. My g/f and I wanted to ask them “what the fuck were you thinking?” but they were already having a bad day.

It was a long drive home, but it was a good vacation and a much needed break from work.

The Death of Bin Laden

2011-05-05T10:21:00.001-07:00

Yesterday everything in the news was about the death of Bin Laden. I’m personally glad to hear that we finally got him, but I do not believe we should be celebrating the man’s death. It reminds me of when there is a tragedy in the US and we see Muslim’s celebrating our death. When we get to the point that we are celebrating the death of others, we have lost our way. There is nothing wrong with celebrating a victory, but we shouldn’t revel in the deaths of others.

FTW Ride Along

2011-05-05T10:20:00.004-07:00

Last Friday I went with a friend of mine on a ride-in. He’s a Fort Worth Police Officer and invited me to come hang out with him and see what his job is all about. When I was younger, I had some friends that always liked to do ride-in’s. I had never done one, so I thought I would see what it was all about.

He has a night shift so we thought Friday night would be more interesting than a weekday night. I showed up a tad early and after a brief shift meeting and Monster Energy drink we were on the road by about 8:15pm.

We had a fairly new patrol car and he started off by showing me his status screens and things that he was keeping track of – mostly the calls coming out of dispatch. There was some really cool information and toys at his disposal! One of the first things we did is run a plate on a random truck going down the highway. As luck would have it, the guy had a warrant out for his arrest and was currently running without insurance. He had about 4 convictions of no insurance and the warrant was for not having insurance. My friend doesn’t like writing tickets, but this was one of those things he couldn’t let go. He did, however, give the guy a choice between going to jail or getting another $800 ticket for no insurance. The guy took the ticket. That was the only ticket written all night.

The next big task was hooking up with a Tarrant County Sherriff to serve a warrant to a convicted felon (sexual assault, sexual assault to a minor, etc.). That turned out to be a wash, but we went to go find him and ended up in a couple of people’s homes during the process.

A bit later, we had to go to another home when a lady was being taken away by EMTs. We had to escort her young daughter and a friend to her grandmother’s house, etc.

My friend served a warrant to a guy that had tried to commit insurance fraud so we went to the jail. Trust me, it’s not a place you really want to go if you can ever avoid it, but I did managed to get a cat-call whistle from one of the guys while we were walking by his cell. I suppose if I ever go to jail, I’ll get “lucky.”

The last big thing that happened was arresting a guy for beating his girlfriend. The guy was hammered and had hit her a few times. He couldn’t seem to remember what had happened even though he had blood on his clothes from hitting her.

During all this, we constantly ran plates and checked people out. We made a few traffic stops, but everyone was pretty much let off with a warning. Going to jail took a while because there was so much paperwork that had to be done. Driving fast was the order of the night, but only when we had to assist another officer for the guy beating his g/f did we really fly down the highway (no lights). I found that highly entertaining and wished I could also haul ass all over the place with impunity.

Because I was doing a ride-in, the officer in charge has sole discretion of the amount of involvement. My friend pretty much gave me the option to come along on anything unless he specifically said otherwise. For the most part, I didn’t get out for traffic stops, but otherwise went with him at all times. It was a little odd going into people’s homes, and that made me a little uneasy, but I also had an obligation to let my friend know where I was at all times. I pretty much just kept my mouth shut and didn’t say anything. Only one time did a lady ask me for my id and badge number, and I told her I wasn’t a cop and that was the end of it.

It could be a function of my friend’s area of patrol, but I also think that the people who need the help of the police are the same people that are really struggling. Most of our stops / calls were in pretty seedy areas and in some cases the people had cat shit right on the floor – no litter box required. It was fairly disgusting and I felt sorry for most of the people even if they had put themselves in those situations due to poor life choices. It’s one thing to be aware of, and to know about, poor people and the problems they have in their lives. It’s entirely another to be thrust into their lives and see it and experience it first-hand.

Nonetheless – I had a great time even if I was really struggling to stay awake by 3:00am. We rolled in slightly before 6:00am and I took off. Got home by about 6:15am and it really wiped me out for the rest of the day. I’d like to do it again, but it will probably be some time before I go again. My friend said he hopes it would be more exciting. I thought it was great and a good way to show someone what it is all about.

Felt up by the TSA

2011-05-05T10:20:00.003-07:00

I recently had to travel to Rock Springs, WY. It’s a trip I’ve made quite a few times. If you fly on United you leave from an E-gate out of DFW. The security checkpoint recently put in one of the see-you-nekkid scanners. The last time I went through the checkpoint they diverted people away from the scanner right before I got to it. This time, it was just the opposite and I was the first one up. I politely said to the TSA dood that I’d like to opt out. He tells a TSA chick that I’d like to opt out and she proceeds to yell across the entire area “WE HAVE AN OPT OUT. NEED MALE ASSIST.” Seriously? WTF? There were about 10 TSA agents standing around and a bunch of people. I wasn’t embarrassed for me, but for the dufus that felt it was necessary to yell at everyone.

I had to go stand off to the side for a few minutes while they found someone to molest me. To be honest, it wasn’t that bad. The guy was really quick about it and explained the procedure. I stood where I could see all of my belongings, which they never so much as looked at beyond putting them through the x-ray. I found it kind of amusing that he must have checked out my legs about six times each – front of hand, back of hand, from the front, from the back, on each side, etc. I wanted to tell him if he didn’t find anything the first two times, he wasn’t likely to find anything the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth times, either. He felt around the inside of my waistband, but was never particularly invasive beyond that. Of course, if I had suddenly had a stiffie he might have felt more than he bargained for. But….he never felt me up. Not once did he feel around my crotch area. I don’t know if it was just him, or if the TSA has gotten so much heat over that particular procedure that they’ve relaxed it a little bit. I almost felt like I had been cheated out of a good scandal or something.

Let me be Clear

2011-05-05T10:20:00.001-07:00

That I am sick and tired of people using the phrase “let me be clear” or any variation of the phrase. I’m not sure when it started, but it seems like Obama is probably the worst offender and I often think people started using the phrase after his campaign kicked off. Regardless, it’s annoying that everyone now uses the phrase. You shouldn’t have to say “let me be clear.” If you aren’t “clear” enough it’s because you aren’t articulating your thoughts well enough – not because the person listening thinks you are trying to be vague and difficult to understand.

How I Celebrated Turning 40

2011-03-22T10:30:00.003-07:00

Today, I turned 40 years old. I had a few people either ask or comment that they thought I might have had a problem turning 40. I’ll admit that 30 was a breeze, but 40 definitely prompted me to think a bit more about my mortality. That’s not to say I dwelled on it or was really even upset about turning 40, but I could see how someone might think I was upset about it.

I had originally planned a trip to Spain this year, but since we elected not to go I treated myself to a few things. For starters, I bought a new Trijicon TA31RCO-M150CP scope for my M4 early in the year. I had been wanting one for a while and finally decided to buy it. For those of you that know me, I’m a cheap bastard and have problems letting go of my money. Expensive purchases aren’t very common for me.

The next thing I bought was my new guitar:
http://invioletlight.blogspot.com/2011/02/bought-it-music-mann-family-reserve-bfr.html
This was really my 40th bDay present to myself and I’m really glad I picked it up.

But the thing I’ll probably remember most was throwing myself out of an airplane. Ever heard the phrase “why would anyone throw themselves out of a perfectly good airplane?” Well, I can tell you for a fact that no such thing exists, but that’s not why people do it.

My g/f and I were talking a few weeks before my bDay. I was out of town at the time and she asked if I had been thinking about what I wanted to do for my bDay. I don’t think she was quite expecting me to say I wanted to go skydiving.

Her: have you been thinking about what you want to do for your bDay?
Me: Yeah. Yeah I have. I’d like to go skydiving.
Her: what?
Me: skydiving.
Her: really?
Me: yeah.
Her skydiving….

I had been thinking about going for years, but it always seemed like there was an excuse not to go. The two big ones being my schedule and I really wanted to go with a friend or two. We sent out a few feeler emails and got some responses back. My g/f took the time and effort to pick it up from there, look into going and taking the time to coordinate a date and time for everyone. I’ve gotten where I hate doing that kind of thing and that really meant a lot to me that she did that.

She picked Skydive Dallas and while I can’t say I’ve ever been anywhere else she made an excellent choice. Again I wasn’t involved in the scheduling process and what not but it was pretty evident from when we first showed up and the web site that they had really taken the time to put a top-notch facility together. They were very enthusiastic, professional and ran the organization in a most excellent manner. In short, they had their shit together. As Jenny said, she never felt like she was about to get on a ride that was put up at the carnival by someone making $3.50 / hr.

Once we had all the takers my g/f locked in our reservations by securing our deposits. We had a few people that really wanted to go, but just couldn’t afford it. It’s about $220 for your first jump. Once we were locked in it was a matter of looking forward to going. I have talked to a lot of people about skydiving and most people immediately say that they’ll go, or they would never go, but once you get someone committed it’s a whole different story. You could tell right away that everyone was pretty excited, and scared all at the same time. Personally, I would get really excited just thinking about it. Imagining being on the plane and jumping. Could I really do it? Would I chicken out? One night I made the mistake of thinking it through and got my heart rate up high enough that I couldn’t sleep. I’ve since decided that part of the whole experience is mind-fucking yourself until you actually jump out of the plane. As Grasshopper said the day before – “did a week really pass already? Can we wait a few more days?”

We had to get up early to be there for the 8:00am class – that means you are really there at 7:30 to sign your legal rights away and fill out all the paperwork. My g/f and I left at about 6:10am and neither of us are morning people. The night before I didn’t once get worked up over skydiving, but I did think someone was breaking into my g/f’s house at about 2:45 so I proceeded to patrol it with a loaded .45. This pretty much kept me from sleeping the rest of the night so I was exhausted by the time we got there.

Our group:
· Me – nervous, excited and admittedly scared. Hey! If you aren’t scared about jumping out of an airplane for the first time there might be something wrong with you.
· Jenny – nervous, excited, and perhaps more scared than I was.
· Bling! – pretty mellow. He had jumped in the military, but this was his first civilian jump. He was looking forward to it, but wasn’t getting too worked up.
· Grasshopper – pretty scared. He had drank the night before and wasn’t looking so good that morning. I thought he was going to yack before he even got on the plane.
· Jason – more like me. Lot of nervous energy but really looking forward to it.
· Shawn – he started jumping last year and now has somewhere around 50 jumps in. We were all really glad he was there so we could pick his brain.
· Crackula – was originally going, then chickened out. Now wishing she had gone. Still good that she was there and hanging out with us.

Sean getting ready for a jump:

...and we don't know what he's doing here:

We had to sit through a quick class learning about what was about to happen, how to position your body, and things to not do. Then the instructor worked with us a bit to see if we could get our bodies positioned correctly. Everyone was a bit nervous at this point and Hopper and Jason were nervously laughing the entire time. Hopper was white as a sheet.

After class we sat around for a long time waiting for the weather to improve. There was some gusty winds and constant cloud cover preventing anyone from jumping. Skydive Dallas has a great place with a Ping-Pong table, benches, hacky sacks, etc. In retrospect this was probably good as it allowed us all time to calm down. Even Hopper started showing some color, and some spine!!

And finally, the plane was drug out of the hanger and everyone started getting stoked! There were plenty of noobs taking their first jumps, and plenty of experienced jumpers. They usually only take up to two tandems up on the plane on any one trip. Fortunately, three of us got to jump together. Bling! Was to go first and so he got suited up and ready to jump.

The plane was a pretty good sized plane and they clearly were taking care of it. Way overpowered it could climb pretty quick and was good at hauling a bunch of people up at one time. The door is a very simple roll-up type door made of Plexiglas. You can see out of it the entire time. When they pack you in, the last people go in first. This pretty much meant the noobs!

The plane pretty much does a constant take-off, climb to altitude, throw people out, then race down to do it all over again. When I say race down, I mean a full on nose-dive towards the ground. You do not want to be on it. With the exception of the experienced guys it always beat the jumpers down and was pretty much taking off again before the tandem jumps had a chance to land and walk in.

When it's at altitude you can barely see it:

Where are they?

After a few minutes:

Bling! Made it down just fine and had a big grin on his face. He seemed to really enjoy the experience and that got me even more excited. Soon, it was Hopper’s turn to go and he had to go in and get ready. He was looking better, but he still looked really nervous and I couldn’t tell if he was going to be OK or not. Unfortunately, the rest of us had to get suited up for our flight so I didn’t get to see him climb in the plane and take off.

About that time they called the rest of us (me, Jenny, and Jason) to get ready. I had ordered a video package since it was my first jump and my bDay. Gotta go big, right? As we were suiting up Jason got really quiet, but I could tell he was mentally preparing to go. Still excited, but getting himself in the zone. I was just the opposite. I was getting more stoked by the minute. Jenny seemed kind of neutral and I couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or a bad thing. After a short interview it was time to go wait for the plane!!

Since the plane took off before Hopper made it down we didn’t get a chance to see him and find out if he was OK or not. Too late, we were loading up! When you get in the plane they are very specific with where and how they want you to sit. Most of this is to get the experienced folks out of the plane and allow your instructor to secure your harness to the chute and to get everything nice and snug.

As you go up, the plane climbs rapidly and you hit your jump altitude of 13,500 feet in about 10 minutes – this isn’t Delta. Don’t expect a blankie and some warm cookies. On the way up they interviewed me a bit more. Jason and I were exchange high fives and getting excited. Since I was wearing an altimeter I watched it from time to time. At about 2000 feet I tried to get Jenny to look at me and she was white and sweating. Not good. I could tell she was really scared.

Once the door opens and the light comes on things happen pretty fast. My g/f was expecting a bit more time to force herself to jump but the guys in front of her all bailed out in a ball and so the back of the plane was suddenly empty….and here you are looking out of a door at 13,500 feet with the cold wind hitting you! Once the guys started bailing out the staff starts scooting you towards the door really fast. I think this is so that you don’t have time to think about it and freak out. I was just starting to get myself into position when my g/f bailed out of the plane – WOOSH! Gone. Just like that. And then there I was with my left foot right on the edge of the door strapped to my instructor and about to throw myself out of an airplane.

I think for everyone that is a slightly different experience and sensation. When you jump out of the plane they tell you to take a deep breath and then it’s “ready…set…ARCH!” (arching is your body position to skydive) and you are out of the plane between “set” and “arch.” For just a brief second, I thought “oh shit!” and then I was in freefall and rapidly accelerating. There is no stomach-in-your-throat sensation as with riding a ride at Six Flags. I could tell I was accelerating, but that’s not quite the same thing.

You hit about 120 miles an hour in your free fall. It’s incredible. Not only are you hauling ass, the wind is rushing by you and if you get a really cool instructor like I did he will do some spins and things. At one point he spun us so fast the earth literally became a blur. Seeing the ground rush up at you is also pretty amazing but again, it is incredible. I’m not sure there are any accurate words to describe it. Exhilarating comes close.

While we were in free fall I was caught between looking down and looking at the video photographer. It’s really bizarre that they are within a few feet of you the entire time. Close enough to give a high-five to (which I did)…. Now that I think about it, that’s a REAL high-five.

You fall 10,000 feet in that one minute and it seems like it lasts a very long time. Your adrenaline is going a zillion miles an hour and I screamed my head off the entire time – this was not your little girl scream either. This was a manly, adrenaline fueled, full on excited scream. FUUUUCCKK YEAAAAHHHHH!!!

My instructor spun us around a little bit and I think when he could tell I wasn’t freaking out he really sent us into a spin that was so fast that the earth blurred beneath us. Then he’d do the same thing in the opposite direction. AWESOME!

The chute popping is probably the most physically demanding part of the jump as your body pulls a G or two as you rapidly slow down. Once that happens, though, it’s very peaceful and relaxing. There is almost no wind noise and you can have a conversation with your instructor without even raising your voice.

He let me “fly” the chute a bit and we did some hard banking turns left, then right, then back left, etc. That was pretty cool because it sling-shots you from one side to the other and you can really get some g-force going. Fun times.

He brought us in for a just-about-perfect stand-up landing and I was still really excited. What a rush. The amount of adrenaline coursing through you is amazing. Everyone that went that day had a huge grin on their face afterwards and really loved the experience.

We all had a celebratory beer out at the car and all but one of us bought our next jump to be used at a later date. The skydiving was an incredible experience and even now, 2 days later, I am still pumped just thinking about it. I had a really cool instructor to jump with (Casey!) and all the folks at Skydive Dallas were great.

The quick stats for those of you that were skimming:
· Jump is from 13,500 feet.
· Free fall for about 60 seconds, at about 120mph. About a 10,000 foot drop.
· Chute pops at about 3,500 feet and is probably the most physically demanding as you pull a g or two slowing down.
· Once the chute is open, it’s very quiet and peaceful for about three to five minutes until you land.

It was a long drive home and I managed to grab about 45 minutes of sleep before getting up and heading to my bDay party. Hopper and his wife were gracious enough to host the party and really went out of their way to put together decorations, and great spread, and the most killer bDay cake I can remember (thanks again you two!).

I hadn’t told my folks about skydiving as my mom is a bit of a worry-wart. However, at the party we popped in the video of the jump and I just let them watch it. I could tell my mom wasn’t too happy, but I had a little trouble gauging my dad’s reaction. I think they were happy that I was back on the ground!!

The party was great. I saw some friends I hadn’t seen in a long time. I also had some of my good friends there to celebrate with me. Some of them even took off work to be there!! I really appreciated everyone showing up that could make it.

We wrapped up about 3:45am and I headed home to crash out. Man was I tired!! About 4 hours of sleep, jumped out of an airplane at 13,500 feet and partied with my friends until the wee hours of the morning. I suppose there are better way to celebrate a bDay, but I can’t really think of any.

Crashing at Friend's

2011-02-28T08:28:00.000-07:00

Saturday was a good, but fairly long day for me. I had gotten up early and went to the hardware store to buy a few things. I spent the next few hours doing yard work (getting ready for spring!) and then went to the Rahr brewery in Fort Worth. My friend is a fellow cheap bastard, and I actually out-cheap-bastarded him by talking him into driving so I didn’t have to pay for gas.

He took me to the brewery and we got there about a ½-hour before last call. We had to suck down the suds pretty quick, but at $7 for three pints of beer and a free glass it was a pretty good deal. We also went and had some nachos afterwards to put a little food in our stomachs. I hadn’t seen my friend in a while and we mostly talked about skiing / snowboarding.

Later, I went over to Grasshoppers to help them out with their network. They fed me some dinner and we had quite a few beverages while playing Xbox Connect with the kids. Good times.

I was getting tired and was ready to go home, but Hopper didn’t feel I was safe to drive. I am not sure I agreed with him, but my rule-of-thumb is that if I am out drinking and someone says they don’t think I should drive I don’t argue. He and his wife made up the couch for me, but I just don’t sleep well at other’s houses. I crashed out for a few hours and finally woke ‘em up at about 7:00am so I could go home (they had my keys and the house alarm was set!).

While one might chose to be upset about the situation I wasn’t. I may have been perfectly find to drive, but I appreciate that someone was looking out for me.

BFR-6 Second Impressions

2011-02-24T08:30:00.001-07:00

My friend, Grasshopper, came over last night to jam a bit. He’s just getting into electric guitars so he brought over his new amp (a vox practice amp w/modeling), a new guitar (epiphone les paul), an acoustic amp, some harmonicas and some microphones. We didn’t jam nearly as much as we swapped guitars, played stuff through different amps and just experimented with different combinations of stuff.

I hadn’t played the new axe, yet, so that was one of the first things we did. We plugged it into my normal amp and listened to the humbuckers. We also swapped back and forth between it and the Les Paul. You can definitely hear a difference. I wouldn’t say it’s less “beefy” but it definitely has different tonal characteristics. We also tried the piezo on my normal settings and while it sounded great, you didn’t get that clean, acoustic sound out of it. Next, we plugged it into his acoustic amp and sure enough the piezo shined like a diamond in a goat’s ass. So then I had both amps going just to mess with things. I tell you what – the acoustic range of the guitar is incredible. I can see that I am going to have to start jacking with my rig again to get all the sounds out of it that are possible.

The other thing I noticed about it is that it’s just easy to play. That doesn’t mean I play it well, but it is immediately comfortable and it’s very responsive to anything you do to it. It feels just as comfortable, if not more-so, as my Les Paul that I’ve been playing for longer than I care to admit. I can tell that tuning it is not quite as quick as my ‘Paul since it has a floating bridge, but it still tunes up pretty quick. I even switched to some drop-D tunings and went back and forth without too much effort. Again, not quite as fast as the ‘Paul, but not nothing like the nightmare my old Floyd Rose tremolo was. I can’t quite tell if it stays in tune as well as I want. I had the window open so the room temps were fluctuating and, like I said, I was intentionally jacking with the tuning quite a bit. I’m going to jam on it some more tonight to see how it does.

I did find one thing I don’t like about it. When it’s plugged in I can’t set it on my usual guitar stand or it pinches the cable. If I set it on my tri-stand it’s fine since it sits up a little higher. That’s a pretty minor complaint.

Bought It!! Music Mann Family Reserve BFR-6

2011-02-24T08:29:00.001-07:00

Well… I bought that axe I had been checking out. It’s the Ernie Ball Music Man Family Reserve BFR-6. I was really on the fence about this one. It’s a very expensive guitar, but encouragement from my friends helped. One of the things that pushed me over the edge was that everyone was having a President’s Day Weekend sale. I made the mistake of checking out Musician’s Friend last night to see what the price would be with the sale. As it turns out, I couldn’t apply the coupon code so I chatted with a guy and he said to call. I called and they said that Ernie Ball wasn’t participating in the sale, but that they’d do it anyway, but only on the black guitar since everything else was special order. I told him I wanted to think about it and I’d call back.

Since I believe in supporting the local community and businesses, and since one of the sales guys at Guitar Center let me play one about a month ago I headed up there this morning. I got there right after opening so it wasn’t very crowded. The guy I originally worked with wasn’t there so I worked with another guy. I was straight up and told him about my phone call and Musician’s Friend willing to apply the 15% discount because of the sale. I told him that since the first guy let me play I wanted to give G.C. the opportunity to sell me the axe. He said they’d apply the 15% discount, too. So I explained that I also wouldn’t have to pay sales tax from Musician’s Friend – about $200 on a guitar that was now just over $2,500. He spoke to the manager and agreed to sell me the out-the-door-price for a tick over $2,500 (basically what the price would be without tax). This effectively saved me about $700 on the guitar! Sold!!

Three advantages here:
1 – I could pick any color they had in stock for the price. Musician’s Friend would only allow me to apply the discount to the black guitar. This way I had a little more selection. The red one was the only guitar that showed the wood grain all the way through the axe, and that sold me on it. (see pic 04).
2 – Guitar Center has a 30-day return policy. Musician’s Friend is only 10 days after shipment. Not knowing when I’d receive the axe, I might not be able to return it from Musician’s Friend if I was out of town when it came in. This way, I can play it for a bit before making that final decision.
3 – I could take it home today! Not really a big factor in my decision, but it was nice to not have to wait 3 months to get one in my hands.

Everyone up at Guitar Center was great and ironically, though I never show my receipt, I was glad I did. The serial number was wrong on the receipt and they had to fix it. As an extra tid-bit of information this guitar, literally THIS guitar, was the same guitar that Guitar Center used in its photo shoot for their platinum lineup of guitars on the web site. The box even had the labels from the photo shoot on it.

So, this is my 40th bDay present to myself – a tad early. Not sure if I would have bought it without the sale, and encouragement from my friends, but that definitely pushed me over the edge. Will it make me a better guitar player? Absolutely not, but I should get a lot of enjoyment out of it. At least I hope to. I haven’t even played it, yet, since I brought it home. The tubes are warming up as I type….

Crunch Time!

2011-02-24T08:26:00.001-07:00

Last night I was involved in a motor vehicle “accident.” There is a dangerous intersection by my house that always has wrecks in or near it. The police told me that they clear a MVH about 4 times a week from there. Mostly people are just impatient and do stupid things. I’m always very cautious when going through that intersection.

Last night at about 5:45pm I was approaching the intersection. I was heading north-bound and a car coming from the opposite direction took a left-hand turn right in front of me. Fortunately, I saw this guy and was all over the brakes. I was able to slow down enough that he escaped without damage. However, what really stunned me was the second car that did the exact same thing. I couldn’t avoid this one and ended up hitting her t-bone style.

When I hit her I immediately looked up at the light and saw it change from green to yellow. As long as the light wasn’t malfunctioning I should have had the right of way. As it turns out, the third car in line to take a left was a police officer. He witnessed the entire event and told me that he couldn’t believe the first guy and was totally shocked at the second car (the one I hit). He also told me that he witnessed the whole thing, you don’t get a better witness than a cop, and not to worry about anything.

My truck was drivable, but I can tell there is some major damage to it. I’m concerned that the crumple zones in the frame are shot. The other car didn’t fare so well and had to be towed off. Fortunately everyone had insurance and nobody was hurt. I’m a little bummed out, though. I won’t say my truck didn’t have a scratch, but for being 10 years old it was in pristine condition. Only has 59,000 miles on it. Used trucks in good shape are worth something. Used trucks that have been wrecked aren’t. We’ll see what happens with the insurance companies.

The Flames were THIS big!!

2011-02-24T08:22:00.003-07:00

You might be inclined to think I’m referring to the little gay guy selling sunglasses at the SLC airport, but I’m actually referring to me catching my friend’s snowmobile on fire. Other than one time when we had to ride some snowmobiles for work I’ve never been on a snowmobile. The time for work almost doesn’t even count. We rode them in a pretty flat spot, up a road that just had a tad too much snow for cars and trucks to make it. It was maybe a ½ mile or more to the radio towers we were going to be working on, and then we rode them right back. In actuality this wasn’t a good impression or experience as the sleds were god-knows-how-many years old and wouldn’t hardly start, or run.

Yesterday, however, was a completely different scenario. My friend, Scott is a hard-core sled-head. We had pretty much finished up work for the week and since there was a snow dump in the Wyoming Range about 35 miles west of Pinedale, WY he decided to take off and hit the powder. He invited me along and fortunately for me, my boss gave me a thumbs up to take a day off and have some fun.

We took off about 7:00am and were unloading the sleds by about 9:30am. I had my snowboard gear, and he let me borrow a peeps, helmet and balaclava. I really didn’t know what to expect, but I was pretty stoked. My only prior experience didn’t do much for me, but I knew there was more to it than that.

Scott went over the sled with me and showed me all the basics before we ever even got going. I knew he really wanted to get out there and play, but he was very patient with me. I was riding a Ski-Doo Summit 800cc two-stoke with a 159 track. He was riding a slightly larger sled with a longer track. It was quickly evident that these were NOT the same kinds of sleds I rode to get my work done.

We took off down the trail and I could easily tell that the sleds had a lot more horse power than what I had previously been on. It was really pretty riding down the trail and I could quickly see why people would do trail riding. However, Scott is not a trail rider and the trail was only a means to get to the powder fields.

A little more than ½ way in, he took me into a small clearing with a hill and some trees. He taught me how to work the sled by transferring my weight, standing in different places, etc. I can’t say that I really got the hang of it right away and felt that I was often fighting the sled. It wanted to go left, I wanted to go right and no matter how much I turned the bars it would go left. He had me mimic his lines and body language and that helped a lot though I was still struggling a bit. One thing he did compliment me on was that while I might be fighting the sled a bit, when it was evident that I couldn’t get it to do what I wanted to I would give in and pick a new line to avoid trees and stuff. I probably get some of that from snowboard – sometimes you are at the mercy of mother nature and have to go with it.

We got back on the trail and headed further into the backcountry. When it split he told me that the “big-boys” go off in a particular direction. We, however, took the other fork in the road. The trail got a little more technical and Scott started playing by running up fairly sizeable hills and jumping off the other side. I wasn’t ready for this and kept to the trail knowing he’d come out on the other side. And finally, we were in a huge powder field. The trail kept going off in a different direction, but it was clearly time to play and learn.

While Scott was playing, I was learning. Don’t get me wrong. I was having a blast but it was quickly evident that I didn’t quite have it down. The powder was really sweet. Scott wanted it to be deeper, but we both agreed that it was probably just about perfect for someone to learn in. There was anywhere from 5” to 12” of good fluffy stuff on top of a harder base. At one spot everything funneled into a group of trees. Rather than hit the trees I stopped and had Scott get the sled back to a safer position. I was getting a little frustrated because I still felt that no matter how much weight I had on one side of the sled I still was unable to get it do what I wanted it to. Again, Scott was really patient with me and kept giving me pointers. I stuck the sled once in some powder, but we didn’t have to dig it out or anything. Scott is just better than I am and knows what to do in those situations.

At this point I was just amazed at how hard I was working. If you’ve never been, and never gotten off a trail you might not realize that you never sit down. Ever. For anything. You are always standing up and there is always force being applied to your legs. Then you absorb all the bumps and jump from side to side over the seat to shift your weight around. When you accelerate you have to hang on. Decelerate suddenly and you are doing a “push-up” to keep from slamming into the bars. Your core is also working constantly to keep everything together. Imagine going to the gym and doing pushups, dumbbell curls, squats, dips, and aerobics all at the same time….without much rest.

After we climbed a few hills and played for a while he took me to another spot. I could tell I was starting to become fatigued but was still going for it. And finally, it really started to click. I followed Scott into a field and through some troughs…shift left, shift right, balance the sled on one ski on the side of this hill, then throw everything over and balance it on one ski on the other side for the next hill. I was getting it and I wasn’t fighting the sled. Climb a hill, do a u-turn on a steep embankment, fly down the next hill, side-ways across the next, etc.

But it wasn’t all gravy. I was really struggling to control everything and I was getting more fatigued by the moment. And then just as I thought I was really getting everything down Scott climbed up a hill and waved for me to follow. No problem, I got this. Only…I didn’t. As I went up the hill I started to drift left and was getting off my line. More weight right! More weight right! I was telling myself….so I was on the right leaned way out…and I still went left. Time to bail out! Turned the sled downhill and went for another run at it. I tried about three times, but could never figure out what I was doing wrong. I would watch Scott get on the right of his sled and go straight up the hill. I’d do it and go to the left every time. ARRGGH!!!

So we gave up on that and went to another area called Gun Sight. This was a really beautiful place where a natural split in the mountains looked just like a gun sight. We stopped to rest and get some water. Scott said that while the powder wasn’t deep he’d never seen so much snow cover.

Back on the trail and back through more fields. We came down some really steep spots (well, steep to a noob) and it was a blast! We stopped at a warming hut to eat lunch. I set the parking break and went inside. We didn’t really need to be warmer, I was already drenched in sweat. Thank God for good wicking thermals. As we munched on some food I told Scott that while I hated to sound like a pussy I was really amazed at how fatigued I was getting. He said he wanted to take me to one more spot where we could see the Grand Tetons and then we’d start heading out.

Back on the sleds and about a ½-mile later he tells me to stop while he goes and checks out a hill. While I am watching him climb the hill I start smelling something burning. I look down and there is a little smoke coming from the engine well. I had just turned on the hand warmers and thought it might be related so I switched them off. No help and now I was seeing some flames. For a brief moment I panicked because the flames were right where the huge oil reservoir was. But I quickly contained myself and knew I had to put the fire out. Scott was nowhere to be seen. I jumped off the sled, popped open the engine cover and saw a small fire with 1” to 2” flames. I started throwing snow on it to put the fire out. It took a while and I think I smothered it more than anything. Everything was hot and melted and gooey. Scott finally topped back over the hill and I was waving at him. He thought I was trying to tell him where I was – uh, no. I’m the only man-made thing in the middle of a huge field! But he finally comes back and realizes something was wrong when the engine cover was open and there was snow packed in the compartment.

Well, what had happened was that I put the parking break on when we stopped for lunch. I didn’t take it off when we took off again. Unfortunately, the sled WILL go if you give it enough gas ! The rotor over heated and melted the oil reservoir to the point where it started leaking and the hot oil ignited. We were fortunate that we hadn’t gone further or it could have really been bad.

Upon inspection we realized that it wasn’t that bad, but it was bad enough that when Scott went to start the sled the started handle came off in his hands. We had to manually start the sled back up. Unfortunately, since the oil reservoir was leaking we couldn’t continue on. Scott rode the sled a bit to make sure it was relatively OK and then we switched sleds to head out.

I followed him out and he stopped periodically to make sure there was still some oil in the resivour. Again, these are two-stroke engines and require an oil and gas mixture to run so we couldn’t run it without oil.

We made it out and popped the cover off. It looked like we needed to replace – the oil reservoir, the guide for the pull-cord, a brake line, a water line, a bearing, and some seals. Scott stopped off at the local dealer and I paid for all the parts. I figured it was the least I could do since I set his sled on fire. When we told the dealer what happened he said he heard that quite a few times. I told him he needed to put a “dumb ass” kit together for whenever someone rode off with the parking brake on. Rode off with the break on? You need our dumb-ass kit. It comes with all the parts you need.

I felt horrible, but he laughed it off and said shit happens. He really was very understanding, but he did tell me I had to tell his wife. He invited me over for dinner and we were going to tear all the bad parts off. When I got there, his wife asked me if I had a good time. I told her it was awesome, etc. and then told her I caught her sled on fire. She didn’t believe us at first. She thought we were fucking with her. Then she realized we were serious, but fortunately laughed it off and said shit happens. All in all I felt very fortunate that both of them were so understanding. Scott gave me shit about my “mangina” hurting and perhaps he is right. I’m pretty sore today and my muscles are still very tired.

Scott has some work to do on the sled. I had a great time, and learned a valuable lesson – don’t touch the parking brake on a snowmobile. I also learned that it will really take some time to get good at snowmobiling. I’d like to do it again, but next time I’ll try not to catch someone else’s sled on fire.

Music Man BFR 6 Quickie Review

2011-02-12T14:06:00.003-07:00

I was out screwing around on the bike today and decided to go check out the Music Man BFR 6 – this is the John Petrucci Family Reserve model and it’s supposed to be one hell of a nice guitar (better be for the price).

I had to get someone to unlock it off the wall so I could play it. I tried it through a Line-6 All Tube new-fangled whiz-mo amp that I wasn’t familiar with, but got the basics down fairly quick. The first thing that impressed me was the weight of the guitar. It didn’t feel light and cheap like a lot of electric “shredder” guitars and you could instantly see and feel the quality of craftsmanship.

The guitar has two jacks, 2 pickup selectors, and 3 volume pots. It’s a bit intimidating at first, but you can get the hang of it fairly quickly. One thing that was nice is that you can choose to use the peizo by itself (jack a) or use it with the humbuckers (jack-b). If you used jack b, you could further tweak the mix on the back of the guitar but it’s not convenient as you need a small screwdriver. Maybe this is good as a large pot could easily get manipulated. Even if you used it in combination with the humbuckers you could still use a selector switch that was peizo-only, humbuckers only, or a mix of the two. Whether the humbuckers were used with the peizo or not, you also had a three way selector for them – neck, bridge, or both. In other words you could squeeze a whole ton of variety of sounds out of the guitar by just altering what jack you were in and what pickups you wanted to hear. There are even more options with tone control, etc., but I didn’t mess with it much beyond what I just described because I didn’t know you could do that.

The next thing I really focused on was the comfort of the guitar, and it’s quite comfortable. The neck had a very slight relief from the factory and I thought the string height could be a tad more sorted out, but then again I’ve tweaked the hell out of my guitars so the strings are just high enough to not get fret buzz. I then strummed a bit on it with a clean channel on the amp just to get a feel for it. Very nice, very comfortable neck and bridge setup. The floating tremolo is pretty unique and is not even close to my Floyd Rose setup. I have to say I like this one better. Interestingly enough, it doesn’t have a locking nut like I would expect to see on most floating tremolos. Does it stay in tune?

The tuning was just barely off and I wanted to see what would happen if I went to a drop D. This is normally a pretty painful process on a Floyd Rose setup because all the strings will come out of tune if you start jacking with it. This guitar has locking tuners. I wasn’t familiar with these, but quickly realized the error of my ways when I unlocked one of the tuners and the string immediately lost all of its tension. WTF? Upon closer inspection the string had no wrap around the peg other than what was required to obtain the correct pitch. What I figured out, and what I confirmed from the guitar dood was that the locking tuner locks the string onto the peg meaning you don’t have to have a wrap. I’m not 100% sure, but this also may explain why the strings tended to stay in tune better when I dropped the E down to a D. Other than the one string I screwed up, the rest stayed fairly well tuned. The tuning keys themselves felt very solid as if the gearing mechanism was somehow tighter and engineered better than any other tuner I had ever tried (even better than some Grovers). After I got the guitar in a drop-D I changed channels on the amp and played around with some chunky sounds. This is what I wanted to hear – is the guitar “thin” sounding or “thick” sounding? To be honest I thought it was a tad thin, but not by much. Again, I played around with the combination of pickups and while I never got the guitar to sound as “fat” as a Les Paul I was pretty impressed with the sound.

Switching back to the clean channel I tried the peizo only. It was hard for me to say, and perhaps it was the amp, but I didn’t think it sounded as much like an acoustic as I was hoping. Still, it could have just been me not understanding the guitar well enough. I think Steve’s Schecter has a great clean / acoustic sound. Somehow I felt like I was failing to achieve this from the BFR 6. I think I’d really have to hear it on equipment I am more familiar with and then give it a back-to-back with Steve’s axe. Also, this peizo is active and if the battery is dead it doesn’t work.

Back to dirty. Re-tune the guitar so it’s not in a drop-D anymore. Dive the whammy….pull it sharp, whatever. Didn’t seem to effect the tuning of the guitar from what I could tell. I was still dealing with the string that I had jacked up. Guitar Dood came in and asked how I was doing and I showed him the jacked up string. He grabbed another guitar off the wall – same guitar, different finish. Now what I immediately noticed is that this newer one sounded thicker than the other one. I asked Guitar Dood if he could hear it. He said no. Then we went back and forth a few times and he finally said I was right and that he could hear it, but it was subtle. I agreed. It wasn’t much, but this was more the sound I wanted to get out of the axe. We couldn’t figure out why one sounded slightly thicker than the other. If you recall, I said that the guitar had push-pull tone pots that I wasn’t aware of. In retrospect, I would guess that the tone of the first guitar had been slightly tweaked and that the second guitar wasn’t. I don’t have a reasonable explanation beyond that unless the QC from the factory is bad and I seriously doubt that.

Conclusion – this is more guitar than I could ever play. It doesn’t quite get as thick as the Les Paul, but it has a great sound, is almost as thick, and is far more versatile than a Paul is. Fit and finish is top-notch. I find the tremolo system to be one of the best I have ever seen and I like the fact that you can change the tuning fairly quickly without having the whole guitar get out of whack. The biggest problem with it is that it’s $3,000 and while Guitar Dood said they could come down on the price that is still a lot of scratch for a guitar.

Guilt doesn’t care….

2011-02-12T14:05:00.005-07:00

…where you are, or what your excuse is. My mom recently had an accident and broke a couple of ribs – I’m not sure what is wrong with my mom, she doesn’t have osteoporosis, but she definitely has some kind of issue with her bones because every time she falls she breaks something. My mom isn’t exactly petite and she has some issues getting around. She always tells me to be careful snowboarding, riding bikes, wakeboarding, whatever…. And I always want to say “you make it one year without breaking something and you can tell me to be careful.”

I was out of town (still am) in Bozeman and was heading to WY. I know she was in the hospital and in a lot of pain, but there wasn’t anything I could do about it. I felt bad that I couldn’t get by to help out or visit.

The Super Bowl is now over, but you may recall the Visa commercials where the guys are talking about making every Super Bowl. In one commercial in particular one guy is saying how he’s missed weddings, funerals, kids being born, etc. My immediate thought was “what a douchebag.” The guy was bragging because he placed the value of entertainment above his family. Douchebag.

In my case, I had no idea my mom was going to get hurt. Still, I miss out on some things that are important to me because of my work. That’s not to say that work takes precedent over everything else, but we all have to work. Would it really matter that much if I was in town but still couldn’t get away because of my job? After all, a couple of broken ribs is very painful but is not life threatening. The one advantage of being home would be that I could have visited after work.

But, this is my life. This is what I do for a living. I don’t remember ever thinking that I would have a job quite like this – traveling, meeting new people and challenges, etc. It just sort of unfolded that way. So, unlike the douchebag in the Visa commercial I’m not making a conscious decision to not be there when something happens. It’s mostly chance. But even at 30,000ft guilt doesn’t care….

Vacation

2011-02-12T14:05:00.003-07:00

As I recently posted, I took a nice vacation over the holidays. I took an even longer vacation from writing on the blog. For those of you who actually read what I post, my apologies. It was necessary, though. One of the reasons I write is not because I think everyone should hear what I have to say. Unlike most of the narcissistic bloggers I really don’t care if you read this or not. I write as an exercise and as a pseudo-diary. It’s a way for me to log my thoughts and ideas. I probably need something closer to twitter, though, mostly because I have so many thoughts and ideas to write on here that I lose track of them.

But as I took my vacation I also became severely disenchanted with everything going on in the world. Even as republicans swept the house I have still been pretty unhappy with the current state of affairs in politics. World events aren’t much better. Even the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords turned into a political ploy by both sides (and no, I don’t care which side started it). And, of course, the sheeple are still in full swing buying whatever the media tells them to. Me, I just had to step back for a bit and just complain to my friends that would raise another glass with me. One day gone, another begins.

Superbowl XVIXXXIWHATEVER – Or How I Spent My Time Watching the Super Bowl

2011-02-12T14:05:00.001-07:00

This year, the Super Bowl was hosted at the home of the Dallas Cowboys in Arlington, TX. That’s where I live. While on some levels it was kind of exciting that so much hoopla was focused on my home town quite a few of us found it to be a nightmare. Long before fans started showing up the city and the NFL started working on the event by blocking of roads and re-routing traffic. Fortunately, I live south of the stadium and didn’t have to deal with much of that.

Seeing as how I really don’t give a rats ass about football my g/f and I planned to get out of town long before the proverbial shit hit the fan. She almost got caught by the ice storms that hit N. Texas, but fortunately got a flight out and met me in Montana where we spent the day snowboarding and skiing. She had one of her most epic days skiing ever and I had a great time running semi-fresh powder runs.
I invited a few friends to come along, but not only did they not come – I didn’t even get ONE response to my invite. I think I am done inviting them to come do things with us.

Naturally we heard about all the problems the weather was causing back home, but we were very happy to not be there. I was caught in a bit of a bind, though. My brother-in-law is a die-hard Steelers fan, and my neighbor a die-hard Packers fan. I knew one of them would be very happy and one of them very un-happy. Looks like this year my brother-in-law was the un-happy one.

Droid X Phone?

2011-02-12T14:04:00.005-07:00

I’ve had a Droid X for a few months now, and so far I really love it. One thing I had some trouble adjusting to was the size of the phone. You don’t really notice in when you are talking on the phone, but you certainly notice it when sticking it in your pocket. The ladies out there that carry a purse probably won’t notice it too much and it’ll be easy to find when digging around in there.

I probably don’t do that much with my phone compared to other people. It’s not linked into a social network like Facebook or some other crap so you know when I’m using the restroom. But what little bit I’ve played with I have really enjoyed. The browser works well enough, albeit somewhat slowly sometimes. I probably use the Angry Birds game and Online Poker apps more than anything. The GPS is pretty good, but not as robust as my Garmin – I understand Garmin may put an app out for the phone which I’d be interested in because that would be one less device to carry around.

Mostly, I use it as a phone and for that it works great. It smokes my old Razr into the ground when it comes to reception. I’ve been pretty impressed with it from that perspective. About the only complaint I have for the phone is that on my old Razr I could feel the buttons and perform functions without having to put my eyes on the phone. Let’s say I wanted to make a call to Bling!. I could flip the phone open, and press the contacts button, and then press 2 a couple of times until I knew it was in the B’s. Then I could briefly look at the phone and scroll to the location by hitting the scroll buttons (this also becomes habitual and you don’t have to look once you do it a few times). One last quick glance to ensure that I have Bling!’s number up and hit the dial button. Through the whole process I barely looked at my phone.

Well, with the new one you can’t do that because you can’t feel any of the buttons. They are just graphic images on the screen. I find it not only slower to look someone up and make a call, but far more dangerous if I am driving or anything that requires my attention.

I’ve tried using the voice command and saying things like “Call Bling!” or “Call *name*” and it always jacks it up and doesn’t even get close causing me more frustration. What I don’t understand is that if you use speech-to-text to enter a text message it nails it 90+% of the time. Same for google search…but ask it to call someone and you can forget it.

But that’s about it. Otherwise a pretty sweet phone.

Happy New Year?

2011-02-12T14:04:00.003-07:00

In some ways, I feel like I didn’t do much this year to bring in the New Year. But if I really look back on it, I had a pretty good time. No wild party or anything, but my g/f and I took a week off to get in some runs skiing / boarding up in Montana. I got to see a lot of my friends that I don’t see very often and we had some good runs on the slopes. We even had a big powder day after a dump up on Big Sky. For New Year’s Eve we had a great dinner and played Xbox Connect with some friends before turning into pumpkins shortly before midnight. I think my g/f made it to 12:02 before she was out and I wasn’t far behind her.

Pre-Christmas

2011-02-12T14:04:00.001-07:00

Last week I was in WY visiting one of my clients. You might recall reading or hearing something about snowstorms hitting the area. I was in it. No biggie, I’ve done it before. With the exception of the North Western portion of WY, it’s not the prettiest place around.

Let me briefly set the scene. It’s snowing, and has been snowing for a day or so. The Interstate is covered in ice and snow. It’s about 6:15am – I had to leave early since I can only drive a mind-numbingly 40mph down the interstate to get to work. It’s dark, and I’m roughly in the middle of no-where listening to “Boogie Woogie Santa” on a country station since it’s the only one I can get in. And suddenly I thought “What the fuck are you doing?”

Not as in I was doing something wrong that very moment, but how I had all the events of my life suddenly led me to be in that particular place at that particular time listening to “Boogie Woogie Santa” while driving 40mph in a snow storm that early in the morning.

I found it a bit surreal and thought about all the “normal” people that were probably getting up and not dealing with driving in a freaking snow storm to get to work on that particular day. I thought about how I wouldn’t normally be doing that. How I could have done a billion other things or at least had also been getting ready to go to work in Texas (no snow) for my normal 9 to 5 grind.

But that’s my life. Odd places, odd times, in odd predicaments, to do a fairly normal job. I’m not sure there are too many things I’d rather be doing….

Customer Service is not Dead

2010-11-10T11:42:00.000-07:00

Lately, I’ve been very disgruntled with many aspects of our society. I was quite pleased to see most of the democrats kicked out of office, though now we’ll have to see if all of those republicans will do any better.

I also have come to believe that customer service is just about dead and that a company will screw you any way they can to make a buck. Recently, I had sent my Diamondback DB380 (compact pistol) back to Diamondback to have them look at it under warranty. I was having a feed-jam issue and another minor issue. I called them and they said to send it in so they could look at it.

It took some time to find a FedEx / UPS site that would ship the gun. The regulations on shipping are roughly that you have to declare it as a firearm to the shipper, must not mark the package as a firearm, must send it 2nd day air, and one of the parties (sender or receiver) must be an FFL. Apparently, the local mom-and-pop shops don’t understand this and won’t ship them. After hunting one down and paying $60 to ship it with insurance I was in a particularly foul mood about the entire situation.

I checked the tracking and I knew that they had received my gun, but since it was close to the weekend I didn’t worry about it. Then, on Tuesday I get an automated message from UPS telling me that a 2nd day air package was on its way to my house and I had to be home to accept delivery of it (signature required). I was pretty sure it was my gun since I don’t have anything else on order at the moment. But why would they send it back? They didn’t contact me in any way, shape, or form. As far as I could tell they didn’t find anything wrong with it and it’s on its way back.

It really irritates me when UPS can’t be any more specific about the delivery. It’s a good thing I work from home, but being stuck at the house all day sucks. I couldn’t leave in case it showed up and I didn’t want to drive to God-knows-where to pick it up if I missed it.
So, side-note….all day I wait for this package. It doesn’t show up. Finally, at about 6:30 at night I am hanging outside with my neighbor having a beer. I see the UPS truck come around the corner. It stops down the street. The guy shuts the truck off, leaves the lights on, gets out and delivers a small package to one of my neighbors. He gets back in, starts the truck up and drives about 35 feet, stops the truck and shuts it off (leaving the lights on) and delivers another package to the guy that lives next door to the first guy. He then gets back in, starts the truck up, drives about 35 more feet turning the corner slightly and shuts it off again. He brings me my package. Why on earth couldn’t he have just parked “in the middle” and delivered all three packages? Must be some jacked up UPS rule or something.

So I get my package and I open it expecting to see some letter with b.s. about nothing wrong, etc., etc. But, to my very big surprise, they sent me a brand new gun! I don’t even know if they looked at the other one or not, but now I have one of the latest and greatest models. I am pretty stunned over the whole situation. In some ways, I wish they had contacted me to say something, but I am absolutely stoked about getting a brand new gun.

Way to go Diamondback Firearms!!

So I am out a few bucks for the shipping, but perhaps the worst part is that I now have to take the gun to the range and break it in!!

More iDiots

2010-10-17T09:42:00.001-07:00

While doing some research for clients that are still having iPad WiFi issues I ran across this great example of what happens to seemingly intelligent people whenever they deal with Apple products. It’s exactly why I hate Apple iDiots and the iDevices. Take look at this article related to even more issues with wireless and the iPad.

Here is the article: http://www.wlanbook.com/ipad-wifi-issues-fix/

This was written by someone that appears to be fairly intelligent, but alas their IQ seems to drop suddenly whenever the iProduct is in their hands.

Note that he indicates that like all the other iPad users he was also having WiFi issues with his iPad. How does he fix it? By essentially downgrading his entire WiFi network to accommodate the limitations of the iPad. He turns off dual radio mode and anything to do with 802.11a. Problem fixed!! Fuck everyone else, the iPad works!!!

In the next section he briefly examines antenna placement (BTW, for those of you not familiar with wireless antenna placement, orientation, etc., is crucial to a good wireless connection). He then has the astounding revelation…and I quote “I’m pretty sure Apple wouldn’t release a product that would be impacted by how it [the antenna] is positioned like some blogs suggested.”

I almost can’t write….I’m caught between laughing so hard I can’t breathe and the sheer horror at the thought of Apple might have put out a product that wasn’t perfect!! I suppose the death grip on the iPhone 4 is also the fault of the user and that standard physics cannot possibly apply to Apple products.

Burning the Quran PT II

2010-09-09T06:24:00.001-07:00

I just read a small snippet in the newspaper about the proposed burning of the Quran in Florida. In the paper, there was a picture of a protest by Muslims in which they were burning an American flag and an effigy of the pastor who plans to burnt he Qurans.

Is it just me, or does the public at large really not get it? Do people really believe this behavior is acceptable? Can you see the irony? It’s OK to burn MY flag, but should one do anything disparaging against the Quran then holy shit – kill people and burn buildings!!

To quote Chuck Morse (conservative talk show host and writer), who showed how successful “Islamic fundamentalist have been…in their international campaign of threats and terror…the world is now cowering in fear.”

When are we going to stop living in fear of Islam?

Burning the Quran

2010-09-09T06:02:00.003-07:00

Recently, I heard about the preacher in Florida that plans to burn the Quran on September 11th. The guy or church obviously wanted the publicity as nobody would probably find out about a small church burning a book.

Now, before I go any further let me state that I completely agree with everyone who has said that this is not a good idea. I do not believe that if you want to resolve a conflict you do so by antagonizing someone. Clearly burning the Quran is going to antagonize Muslims.

So let me get to my second opinion – I say go for it. I am sick and tired of people being afraid of retaliation by Muslims. Doesn’t anyone get it? It’s not a religion of peace. If it were, we wouldn’t be concerned about a militant uprising, riots, and death threats. People get upset when there is flag burning, bible burning, etc., but the entire media doesn’t pick it up and run it as a story because ultimately we tolerate it and respect it as a First Amendment right.

In this case, however, the media has picked it up and is saying how terrible things are going to be. Why? Were it truly a religion of peace there shouldn’t be ANY worry of violence. Peaceful protesting? Sure. Saying it’s wrong? Absolutely. Threating people and blowing stuff up? What is wrong with you?

In my opinion, Muslims show their true colors in situations like this. Hey, look….if you are a Muslim and you are reading this – if you truly want to foster a positive relationship with American and the rest of the world then don’t do ANYTHING. That’s right. Ignore it. Let it go and simply ignore it. If you want to agree that it was in poor taste and let that be it that's fine, but otherwise don't do anything. I’ll believe Muslims as a whole are peaceful when they stop perpetuating and supporting violent behavior. If “radical” Muslims kill somebody over this and millions of “peaceful” Muslims flock to the street in protest of the violent behavior, then I’ll change my tune.

Are we placing bets?

Give up more personal time?

2010-09-09T06:02:00.001-07:00

I’m out of town…again. I sure feel like I have been on the road way too much this year. I even told my boss that I was traveling too much. He agreed, but didn’t have a good answer for me. Unfortunately, we are still short staffed.
For some reason, we just can’t seem to find anyone that meets all of our qualifications and lives where we need them to, or is willing to move where we need them to. For that reason, I may start traveling up to Montana even more. I love MT, but I’m just sick of traveling. I had to work out a few details before I’d agree to start going up there. Looks like I am going to have to do 2 weeks on, 2 weeks off. At least until we get someone else trained to take over the position – I figure that will take a few months.

One of the conditions for me to start going up there again was no travel on the weekends. If you’ve read my blog for any length of time you know that this was a major problem for me last time I was going up there all the time. When I agreed to stay with the company one of the stipulations was that I would no longer travel on my time unless there were mitigating circumstances – regular work does not qualify.

Surprisingly enough the company asked if I’d meet them in the middle and travel on one of my weekend either going up or coming back. Basically, would I be willing to ignore our current agreement and forget the fact that I have been traveling my ass off this year, and forget that I am trying to do them a favor. I can see where they are coming from, but I’m not willing to give that up and said as much. Strange.

I hope we find someone soon. This is going to be tough….

Random Thoughts in August

2010-08-22T09:04:00.002-07:00

I’ve been spending most of my free time on the www.twowheeltrips.com website. Little tweaks here and there. It’s not exactly taking off, but I had a feeling it might be a while before it gets heavily utilized.

I think NYC affected far more than I would have liked. Every since I’ve been home I’ve had a terrible time of feeling depressed and somewhat anti-social. I can’t explain it, but I’m not very happy right now and yet I have no real reason to be unhappy.

I may have to start traveling up to Montana a bit more. I’m trying to work out the details with my company – one of which is to be a shortened and definitive schedule. I can’t go up there for six months and not know when I’m coming home or anything. It would help if we could just find someone to work for us up there. If you are a Systems / Network Engineer and would like a job let me know!

I haven’t been feeling very creative (see above), but I had a jam with some friends and have slowly been working on some new material. Nothing to get excited about. I need to find a good way to lay down tracks on the computer, but haven’t made up my mind on what kind of interface to use.

I have to travel to WY this week for a gig with a customer. Fortunately it’s only for a few days.
One of my good friends came and stayed with me for a few days. Unfortunately, it was because he was going to leave his wife. They’ve had problems even before they got married and the problems just got worse and worse over the years. I think I have heard him say “I’m done” or “it’s over” at least 30 or 40 times. The thing is, he really needs to be done with her. They are both wrapped up in each other. I let him stay here so he would have a place to stay and continue to work while working through a divorce. But, he just can’t stay away from her and he ended up going back and staying over there and only coming over here when they would fight – almost every night. Then it was staying over there more and more. I finally had to ask him to get his stuff out. I’m not a ½-way house, but more importantly I can’t enable him to have a way out of a bad situation for only a night or two. He needs to deal with it. I really felt bad because he was asking if he could leave important documents over here. As he puts it everything gets destroyed when they fight. He can’t have a safety deposit box because that would mean he is hiding something from his wife and she will freak out on him (he’s not really hiding something, but that is how she thinks). He also asked if he could leave some socks, undies, or bathroom supplies over here in case he needed them. I said no. He doesn’t seem to understand that that would be enabling him to have a way out and allow him to not deal with a situation because his wife is a crazy psychopath.

Grasshopper is home from Iraq. I’ve been hanging out with him and his new wife a bit. It’s really good to see him and perhaps, more importantly, it’s really good to see him happy. Things are going well for them and I’m really glad to see it.

My g/f is in Costa Rica, but I couldn’t make it since I have to do the gig with my client….and it’s hot here. August in TX – we are in our third or fourth week (I forget) of triple digits. At least it will be cool in WY.

Lot’s of other things going on, but I just don’t feel creative enough to write about all of it.

Two Wheel Trips is Online!

2010-08-01T10:48:00.000-07:00

Well I finally got my website online. It’s pretty much for and about motorcycle riders:

http://www.twowheeltrips.com

it took me way too long to get it online, but at least it’s up. We’ll see what happens over the next few months.

Client Climax

2010-07-25T14:58:00.003-07:00

The project climaxed the other night – everything we had been working for came together and they moved from one building to another. I was on the clock for 33.5 hours straight without breaks or rest. What a beating. Now I just have a few more things to do and I am eagerly looking forwarding to going home for a while…..

Canoeing in NY

2010-07-25T14:58:00.001-07:00

My g/f flew up here on the 10th of July. She had to motivate me a bit, but we took a train slightly north of here and rented a canoe from Great Blue Outfitters. Great people and a great outfit. They haven’t been open too long, but seem to be doing well. They offer hiking, backpacking, canoeing, and kayaking trips. If you are in the area, look them up!

The rivers were a bit low for kayaking, so we rented a canoe and hit a place called White-something Pond. Pond is a bit misleading as it’s really a small lake. It was a warm day and we loaded up on sandwiches, sunscreen and water. The outfitters dropped us off and we shoved off into the lake. The lake is small so they don’t allow motor boats on it. Fine with me. We quickly paddled to the other side of the lake and ate lunch in the shade of some trees. The water was pretty clear and you could easily see 10+ feet to the bottom of the shoreline. We mostly hung to the shoreline and watched turtles and other fishes scatter as we floated by them. You couldn’t see any buildings and you could only glimpse some traffic of the nearby road if you made an effort to do so. There were a few other people paddling around the lake as well. We mused at a couple that had rented a kayak and had managed to flip it over in the middle of the lake. They couldn’t get back in and quickly sank it under the water (kayak’s don’t’ completely sink). The best part of the day might have been floating in a small cove covered by trees and shade. We both practically fell asleep while dragonflies lit upon our toes.

It was great to get out of the city, even if only for a few hours. I really needed that.

A Plane Flies Overhead...

2010-07-25T14:57:00.001-07:00

A plane flies overhead. Cars drive down the street, and people are on the sidewalk eager to get home before the rain, or see a friend, or a loved one. There is a rooftop party nearby. I’m still stuck in NYC and my great aunt Gladys will never see these things – she passed away last night.

She almost made it to her 91st birthday. She developed cancer in the last year. She didn’t want to fight it. As she put it, she had a nice long life and was very grateful for the things she had. She was one of those people that was always positive even in the face of adversity. I can’t say that I am built that way, but it was nice to see it in someone. The last time I saw her she was recovering from a broken hip and we all knew she probably wouldn’t make it another year. It seems that once the cancer got aggressive it was over pretty fast.

She died on a Sunday night, and the funeral was on Tuesday. She had her family around her and died in the comfort of her home. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make it and even if I could have it would have been very difficult to get there from NYC in the length of time available. I feel bad that I couldn’t make her funeral, but I also am happy that I got to see her not too long ago.

Afterward – I wrote that the day after her death, on July 11th. I haven’t been able to find the time to post it.

iSuck

2010-07-25T14:56:00.000-07:00

Recently, I’ve been more flustered by Apple products than usual. Thinking back, it seems that Apple has just about always been a thorn in my side with regards to my professional career. Even before I started getting paid to be a geek I would get questions from the occasional Apple / Mac user that I couldn’t answer since they were “strange” and did things differently. You say your floppy is stuck in your Mac and won’t respond to dragging it onto the eject button? Sorry, your fooked. My PC’s floppy drive has a hardware eject button so I don’t worry about that shit.

I even owned an Apple ][c for a brief period of time before Apple pulled the rug out from under its user base and went to the Macintosh. I also still worked on dos-based PCs and found them to be more useful than the Apple series.

Later in life, once I got was working professionally in the industry, the Macintosh would pop up from time to time particularly in media-related fields. Everyone else would have a PC or be on the mainframe except for the Mac user….and of course their shit didn’t work like everyone else. Apple thought it would be a great idea to network Mac’s together just like PCs, and mainframes. Only they thought they would do it differently, just like they did everything else so they invented a piece of crap protocol called AppleTalk that was incompatible with everything else.

So now not only did we have Macs in the offices that were incompatible with anything else we also had to start supporting their crappy networking protocol – even though IPX (Novell), SNA (IBM), and IP (open source) was available.

Oh! You are still having problem with your proprietary application and hardware doing something so someone else can see it? Fuck off. Not my problem.

Then it seemed like for a while Apple faded from the corporate world a bit and at the same time began to adopt universal standards like the IP protocol, and other formats that everyone else on the planet except Mac users were using. So even if they were around, they seemed to get along better with everyone else.

Enter the iPod – This is the little guy that really put Apple back on the map in my opinion. I was very resistant to the initial iPod. I was just getting into MP3 players and I had already had a bout with Sony and their proprietary format. I also didn’t like the idea of having a real hard drive and moving parts inside of a portable device. I wouldn’t go so far as to say the first gen iPods were pieces of crap, but I was skeptical.

By the 3rd, 4th, and 5th generation iPods I think they really had it down. Simple to use, fairly consistently reliable, and it supports open standards like MP3. But it’s the interface that really made the iPod so great. The form factor is a bit of a bonus but the interface makes owning one worth it. Apple got this one right.

And then the iPhone landed…and the iDiots came running. Not that the iPhone is a particularly bad product. In fact, it’s actually fairly nice. Other companies were doing similar things, but Apple released a product that did it with style even if it is a bit of an alien product to me. Why iDiots? Because, like I just said there were other products and still are other products that do it better. But…and it’s a bit but…they locked their product into the AT&T market place. So not only was it very expensive, but it could only be used with the AT&T network. Sure, you could jailbreak it (hack it) and use it with someone else’s network but you just voided your warranty and all support for it.

Is the AT&T network that bad? Perhaps not, but as far as I can tell the Verizon commercials are very appropriate. They have more coverage and for someone like me that travels all over the place this is very important. I’d rather have some coverage, even if at a slower speed, than no coverage at all.

And for me? Personaly? I just didn’t want something else that tethered me even more securely to work, the internet and other online “social” things like Facebook.

And of course, the whole time you have the iThin notebook and all of the iLaptop notebooks on the market. Never mind that they cost almost twice as much as comparable priced laptops that run PC / Linux, etc. And maybe that’s one of my big complaints with Apple products – they are marketing geniuses. They get iSuckers to pay a significant premium for Apple products that are no better than other competing products.

And so people are still buying them… And I’m still fighting issues with them. Oh, some Dr. buys a MacBookPro and we fight all kinds of issues with it. It won’t connect to the wireless network appropriately, then when it does his VMWareFusion doesn’t work right. And why is he running that in the first place? Because the application that he MUST use isn’t supported on a Mac. Yes, I see that all the time – iDiots that buy a Mac product knowing that the application they have to have for work doesn’t work on their stupid iLaptop unless they emulate a PC. Great, so now we have to fuck with that, too. And they do it in freaking droves.

And then BAM – the iPad comes out. I gotta tell ya, I have no idea why you iSuckers buy ‘em. They start at a price tag of about $450 for the lowest end model they sell all the way to about $1000 for the top-of-the-line with WiFi and 3G. And what do you really get? A glorified, portable web browser, or book reader, and…well that’s about it now isn’t it? Yeah, I know you can d/l an app to do something just like your iPhone but are you really going to be creating presentations and documents on the iPad without some external device? I mean, can you imagine typing this blog entry with the on-screen keypad? Yeah, that’s sweet.
And of course – the wireless sucks. Just like the goddamned iLaptops and everything else. We constantly fight iLaptops, iPhones, and now the iPad because they have typically have more problems that other non-Apple products.

And here is really what kills me – I still hear from the iSuckers how great Apple is and how intuitive it is and how it “just works.” And then they are upset and dumbfounded when you are trying to tell them it’s their fucking iWhatever that is the problem. Really? You think it’s the network when I have 600 other devices connected to it both hard-wired and wirelessly but all 8 of your iPads have the exact same problem so it’s the network? Did I tell you that ALL of my clients have same problems with Apple products? My phone is on Verizon and I get a great signal, but it must be something else because your iPad, and iPhone both can’t get an AT&T 3G signal. Aliens perhaps?

These are otherwise fairly intelligent people but they cannot seem to accept the glaringly obvious answer that Apple products don’t always “just work” and that sometimes, every now and then, they are they problem…. So when I see an iWhatever, I cringe. I hate them.

Happy 4th Of July!

2010-07-05T08:38:00.000-07:00

Last night, I sucked it up and went down to check out the Macy’s 4th Of July Fireworks Extravaganza!! (just kidding, that isn’t the official title of the show). It was pretty warm, but I managed to make it to 12th Avenue and 25th where I could catch a breeze off the river.

I got there at about 5-til-9:00 and the people just kept coming and packing it in. Before I knew it, I was deep in a crowd of people I didn’t want to be in, but I had a breeze so I felt fairly lucky. The fireworks kicked off at about 9:20 and lasted until about 9:45. It was quite an impressive show and I just happened to have a view that put all of the fireworks in my entire field of vision (including my perhiphial). I have seen a few internet videos where people clearly didn’t have as good of a view. I think I just got lucky.

I’m glad I took the time to go down there, but I as I was there I was thinking that the people that really deserved to see the show were the folks that were thousands of miles away in a desert land. While we celebrated our independence the men and women in foreign countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan were carrying on with their duties. I hope they got to celebrate some and I hope that they got to see some fireworks. We take things for granted far too often.

Happy Birthday America!

Stuck in NYC - ammendments

2010-07-04T12:08:00.003-07:00

I almost forgot two very important reasons I don't like it here that much:

NYC is dirty and it smells - the stench of decaying garbage is everywhere. It's the first thing I notice when I arrive in NYC and now that the summer is heating up it is particular offensive to my olfactory sense. The people also tend to smell, and I'm not referring to the homeless. I don't know if it's because there are a lot of foreigners here and their hygienic habits aren't as fastidious as typical Americans or what, but I constantly keep catching very strong BO from people while walking around.

In comparison, Tokyo has over 13 million people living in it (compared to 8 for NYC) and it's so clean you can practially eat off the sidewalk.

Our Country is in Serious Trouble

2010-07-04T07:24:00.002-07:00

Recently the US Supreme Court upheld the Second Amendment in the Washington, DC case by a very narrow 5-to-4 vote. Let me say that again, 5-to-4!!! This is our second amendment right granted to us via the constitution from our founding fathers. It should not be that close. If anything, it should be a 9-0 vote.

Just think about it for a moment. A few more liberal appointees and you would have just lost your second amendment rights as interpreted by “the law.” I’ve often said that I think the most powerful thing a president can do is appoint a judge to the US Supreme Court. It’s a lifetime appointment and there isn’t any way to remove a judge from the bench – only death or retirement removes them from the bench.

These judges shape our lives and the course of our country in untold ways. Look at things like the commerce clause – a very poor decision by the SCOTUS (Supreme Court of the United States) has allowed virtually unlimited power of the federal government through this clause.

Now, Obama is trying to appoint even more liberal judges. I suspect that one or two more of them will ride the bench for a while. You will see a shift and that shift will not be good if you believe in liberty, democracy, and the Bill of Rights.

Was it any real surprise that Justice Sotomayor was one of the judges that dissented in the recent decision? This is the person that not only said that they would respect previous SCOTUS decisions as law (she lied and dissented anyway):

SEN. PAT LEAHY (D-VT): “Is It Safe To Say That You Accept The Supreme Court's Decision As Establishing That The Second Amendment Right Is An Individual Right? Is That Correct?” JUDGE SOTOMAYOR: “Yes, Sir.” LEAHY: “Thank you. And in the Second Circuit decision, Maloney v. Cuomo, you, in fact, recognized the Supreme Court decided in Heller that the personal right to bear arms is guaranteed by the Second Amendment of the Constitution against federal law restrictions. Is that correct?” SOTOMAYOR: “It is.” LEAHY: “And you accept and applied the Heller decision when you decided Maloney?” SOTOMAYOR: “Completely, sir. I accepted and applied established Supreme Court precedent that the Supreme Court in its own opinion in Heller acknowledged, answered the -- a different question.” (Judiciary Committee, U.S. Senate, Confirmation Hearing, 7/14/09)

She finds nothing in the second amendment that grants us the right to bear arms for self defense:

DISSENT JOINED BY JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: “I Can Find Nothing In The Second Amendment’s Text, History, Or Underlying Rationale That Could Warrant Characterizing It As ‘Fundamental’ Insofar As It Seeks To Protect The Keeping And Bearing Of Arms For Private Self-Defense Purposes.” (“Otis McDonald, Et Al., Petitioners V. City Of Chicago, Illinois, Et Al.” Justice Breyer Dissent Joined By Justices Ginsburg & Sotomayor, U.S. Supreme Court, P.180-1, 6/28/10)

And now the Chicgo dick-cheese of a mayor (is that libel or slander?) wants to pass new legislation that insofar as I can tell is in direct conflict with the second amendment. He expects “legal battles” which to me says he knows he’s violating the second amendment and just doesn’t care. What happens the next time these laws are challenged and reach SCOTUS?

And folks, this is ONE very small instance – look at the expansion of government and encroachment upon our rights by the government since Obama took office. These are troubling times indeed.

Once in Lifetime Fireworks?

2010-07-04T07:24:00.001-07:00

Most years, Macy’s has their fireworks on the East side of Manhattan. I’m about 2 blocks from the e. side. However, this year they are having them on the West side of Manhattan – about 2 miles away. That’s not that far and I’ve walked over in the general area several times already.

I’m a bit on the fence about going tonight. I’d really like to see the fireworks as it’s supposed to be pretty incredible. On the otherhand, I have absolutely ZERO desire to be stuck in the throng of the other 2 to 3 million people that will also be crowding the public areas. The papers all say to show up four to five HOURS early to get a good spot. Fuck that. I mean, hey, it’s just fireworks!

Years ago, we would take the boat out on the lake on the 4th. A few of the people that lived on the lake were filthy rich and would bring in semi-trailers of fireworks with professionals to set them. I’m not kidding and I’m not exaggerating. These people would then try to out-do each other, but they never launched them all at the same time. Rich person-A would do theirs, then rich person-B would do theirs and so on. We’d float on the water for hours watching some pretty incredible shows from right underneath the fireworks. Sometimes you could feel the ash lightly raining down on you. So for me, the fireworks would have to be pretty freaking incredible to beat that experience and being stuck in a crowd of people in my current state of mind is not it.

I looked into some rooftop parties or a boat cruise or something. Rooftop parties start at about $90 and the pictures show people stuck on top of each other…. The boat cruises are mostly sold out, but they also started at about $100 and went up from there. One cruise is $270, not including taxes, fuel surcharges, boarding fees, etc. I figure that’s about $300 and while it includes a buffet it does not include your beverages – and then you are stuck on the boat for five hours. Might be different if I had a friend to hang out with. In any case, I don’t feel like spending a bunch of money to be stuck in a throng of people watching fireworks – I’d spend the money to NOT be stuck with a bunch of people and see some good fireworks.

And let’s face it, if I ever decide I really have to see the NYC fireworks I can simply come back. So I don’t see it as a once in a lifetime opportunity. I see it as a big pain in the ass. I’ve had a few people ask me if I can watch them from the hotel rooftop. I don’t think there is any roof access – I already tried to go all the way up and the elevator doors wouldn’t open. Even if they did have access tonight the w. river is about 2 miles away and it’s NYC – there are a ton of skyscrapers in the way and you wouldn’t be able to see anything anyway. I’ll probably just head that way this evening and when the crowds start to get thick I’ll stop and chill. If I can’t see anything, I’ll head back.

Stuck in NYC?

2010-07-04T07:23:00.000-07:00

I’ve now been in NYC for about a month and a half. My only venture outside the city was to Las Vegas for a couple of days to attend Grashopper’s wedding. I’ve had a lot of people ask me “why don’t you go home for the weekend?”

Well, quite simply it’s almost more stressful to do that than to just stay here. If I have to work Friday, that means I don’t get to fly home until late Friday night or early Sat. morning. I then have to return back to NYC by Sunday so I can be working on Monday morning. That means I basically get ONE day (Sat) at home for all of the hassle of traveling back and forth. Is that really worth it?

My g/f was having a conversation with a friend and associate of hers that lives here in Manhattan. She mentioned how I was still stuck in NYC and her friend exclaimed “Stuck in NYC?” as in she lives here and this is her home and it’s so great how could anyone feel like they are stuck here?

I’ll tell you how. I realize that some of you (about 8 million) live here and call NYC home. Please try to understand that while it may be great for you, that it is not great for me. I’m not a “big city” person. I never have been. Sure, I like to visit but that’s about it. For me:

• There are too many people. WAY too many people. And going to events where people are on top of each other is just not enjoyable. I don’t care if it’s a bar, a museum, or a block party. I don’t like having people on top of me.

• It’s too noisy – yes, the city that never sleeps. And along with that comes constant noise. You are always attacked by nose. Large trucks and buses driving by on the street, sirens all day and night long, people talking on phones, people talking to themselves, chicks (and guys!) saying the word “like” every 6.3 seconds, horns honking all day and night long (I feel like setting up a .50 cal on the windowsill and picking them off), you get the idea.

• There isn’t any grass or trees. Ok – yeah, there are a few trees embedded into the concrete, and you might find a patch of grass here and there but for the most part it’s concrete for as far as the eye can see. Every time I try going to Central Park there are too many people and too much noise (see above).

• I don’t have my truck here so I can’t easily get out of the city and if I did I wouldn’t want to drive here (people are freaking nuts!)

• I don’t have my bike (motorcycle) here.

• I don’t have my guitar(s) here.

• I don’t have my friends or family here.

• I have a shitty internet connection at the hotel.

• I don’t have my kitchen and my things to enjoy cooking a nice meal.

• There isn’t any place to go hiking or just chill outdoors.

• Everything costs a fortune (Manhattan is expensive!)

• Everyone is rude – I don’t care what the reason is, but people here are rude for the most part.

Call it the New York Attitude, I call it being a jerk – and nobody trust anyone.

iPhone iDiots

2010-07-03T21:16:00.002-07:00

This pretty much sums up what I think about people that have to have a new iPhone (or any new product) on release day.....

Stereotypical, Loud, Obnoxious Black Women….

2010-06-18T10:12:00.000-07:00

….are even more loud and obnoxious in NYC.

Regretfully Guilty?

2010-06-18T07:48:00.000-07:00

One of the things I try to do is live my life without regrets. If I think I will regret something later on, that will have a profound impact on my thought process and the actions that may follow. I’ve done fairly well, especially once I got out of my teenage years.

But recently, I got hit pretty hard with some sad news. A girl I once new recently passed away. She was the first girl I ever really had a “thing” for. I am pretty sure she felt the same way for me, but we never did anything about it. I can’t say why we never did anything about it, but we didn’t. I introduced her to my best friend (at the time) and they ended up getting married and having some kids.

A couple of years ago I saw this guy at a bachelor party for another friend. We hadn’t spoken much in the last few years for no particular reason. Sometimes people just grow apart. He told me that she had recently been diagnosed with congenital heart failure. I was fairly shocked, but I also had heard that she had put on a lot of weight since having kids so while it made sense it didn’t mean that it was easy to hear.

About a day or two ago another friend called me to tell me she had recently passed away. Her husband didn’t know how to get in touch with me but wanted me to know since we had all been friends as kids and I had introduced them. I hadn’t talked to her in over 20 years, but it still saddens me to hear that she passed away. Over the years I had heard a couple of times she had tried to get in touch with me – probably just to say hello and see how I was doing, but I never responded. I am not sure why I didn’t. Maybe I was too busy. Maybe I was afraid of how to respond to her. Maybe I just wanted to remember her the way we were when we were kids. It doesn’t matter now, because she is gone and I’ll never have the opportunity again. I blew it. I fucked up and right now that is a regret I am realizing that I’ll have to live with the rest of my life.

I understand my friend (her husband) is hanging in there and has plenty of people surrounding him right now. I reached out to him, but I think he’s a little overwhelmed at the moment with people calling him and stopping by.

I also feel really bad for her parents. They had two kids, her older brother and her. Her older brother was shot and killed in front of one of my other friend’s house (purely coincidence –they didn’t know each other), and now she has passed on. She was a few years younger than me and her parents were a little younger than mine so I believe they are still alive. You shouldn’t have to outlive both of your children.

She will be missed by many.

Like…Like…Like…..

2010-06-18T07:35:00.001-07:00

I’m not much a grammar and literacy snob – let’s face it, my own grammatical skills could use a lot of work – but lately the poor use of the word “like” has been driving me batty. Maybe it’s because I am stuck in a city with 8 million people jammed on top of each other and I can’t help but overhear a lot of other conversations.

Last week I was in a fairly nice restaurant having a really nice meal of steamed mussels followed by some sautéed soft shell crabs. At the table just in front of me were these two fairly young chicks having martini’s and dinner. My first impression is that they shouldn’t have been able to afford to eat there on a college budget, but eyeballing the shopping bags told me they had other means of income (daddy?).

Well one of the chicks was the talker and the other chick was the listener. Unfortunately, the talker was facing my direction so I could hear her just fine. She really enjoyed using the word “like” to the point it really started grating on my nerves. I would estimate that on average she used the word “like” at least two times in every sentence, perhaps more. It started to ruin my meal.

I was seriously close to offering to buy them a bottle of wine on one condition – she would have to stop using the word “like” for the remainder of the meal unless she actually used the word in a preposition / simile, a conjunction, or a verb. In other words, as non-slang because you can’t figure out how to speak properly and choose more descriptive words. I buy the wine, and I pay for it until the word “like” spews from you mouth.
My guess is that she would have found it fairly insulting – which it would have been. But it’s driving me nuts lately. My favorite is when someone says something to the effect of “I was like….”
NO. You weren’t “like” whatever. You had a thought or a feeling or something and you either were or were not in a particular state. You weren’t “like…”

I catch myself using the word from time to time in the same manner and I try to stop myself and remember there is always a word or phrase that is more descriptive and appropriate. Maybe I’ll get some business cards printed on them with this URL and drop one off next time I am stuck to someone that has to use the word every ten seconds.

Feeling Selfish

2010-06-13T15:24:00.000-07:00

One of my best friends is coming home on leave from Iraq. He’s going to get married in Vegas when he gets home. His original dates for getting married worked great for me, but the new ones are coinciding with a big project I have to do for work. No way I could get out of it. Now the dates (for work) are slipping so I am going to try to make it to the wedding.

I feel bad, because when I get to Vegas I’ll have been on the road for over a month. It will also take me about 8 hours of travel to get to Vegas so I can be there for him. I’m working long hours and the city (NYC) is really grating on me. I know when I get there I’ll be tired and burned out with one main thought on my mind – home.

Why is this selfish? I’m pretty sure I wrote about this before, but let’s look at it from my friend’s perspective. He’s on his way back to the U.S. right now. I don’t know if he’s in Iraq, Kuwait, Germany, or over the ocean somewhere. It takes him two to three days to get home!! That makes my eight hours of travel seem pretty insignificant right there.

Let’s also not forget that he has been away from home since November of last year. He’s been out of the country for almost as long. Again, I’ll have only been away from home for about 6 weeks once I make it to Vegas. I have a nice room, good restaurants and bars, and most of the creature comforts we have come to know in the U.S. He’s been standing guard duty in sandstorms, rooming with multiple people, and generally living a much harsher life than most of us.

So, while it doesn’t make me feel any better…it does kind of help me screw my head on straight. Whether you personally believe in the war, or whether or not “we” should be there, it’s really “they” that are there….the men and women of our armed forces and we should respect the sacrifice that they are making.

I’m going to go out and have a nice dinner tonight, and I’ll sleep safe thanks to those people who make that sacrifice every day – regardless of where they are. And, when I get to Vegas and I’m tired and worn out I’ll remember that one of my best friends has been through far worse to make it back home and marry the one he loves. Oh yeah, the party is ON!

Perspective is Everything!

2010-06-13T09:18:00.002-07:00

Here we have Duke’s – a “famous” Manhattan BBQ restaurant and hang out (btw – not worth a crap in my opinion)

And here we have Dyke’s – an equally famous hang out for those urban man-hating lesbians that enjoy ribs, beer, and “finger” foods.

Jack in the Box and Assault Rifles

2010-06-08T15:16:00.000-07:00

I just woke from a very strange dream. The dream was also a bad dream, though not necessarily a nightmare. Almost everything in the dream was related to things that have been happening around me:

· I was on a road trip (I am on a road trip, now)

· We were traveling in an RV and had stopped for a bite to eat (I’ve been emailing / IMing about traveling lately. I was also thinking about dinner before I fell asleep. My neighbors are competition Chili cooks and travel to cook offs in an RV. I was exchanging emails with them recently).

· In the dream I was in a generic fast food joint, though it could have been a jack-in-the-box. (haven’t quite figured out the relationship there).

· In the dream, I was naked, though I seemed to alternate between being naked and wearing my “I Love Midget Porn” t-shirt. Everybody was staring at me and was offended – especially the parents of the little kids (lately I’ve exchanged some emails that are dealing with academic freedom, and freedom of speech issues as well as having read some recent articles on it.).

· The fast food joint had run out of buns and people were really angry (not real sure about the buns, but I’m not partial to a burger with a ton of bread. The angry part is probably ‘cuz my window was open and I could hear the random noise of a NYC street with people yelling and screaming at each other, or because I was naked).

· For some reason, I couldn’t get my food so I was sitting there mostly naked and holding an M4 (hey! I like big guns, and I remember thinking “this isn’t illegal since it isn’t concealed.” I just had a recent email regarding handgun concealment).

· And last, but not least, I was then suddenly in the RV. It was warm and I was buried under a bunch of blankets and pillows and was suffocating trying to get up. (I was napping on the couch and knew that I should not stay asleep long so I was trying to force myself awake).

Anyone with an RV and an assault rifle want to go to Jack in the Box with me?

Is Everyone In NYC Gay?

2010-06-06T08:26:00.001-07:00

It seems to stand to reason that in most big cities you have a higher percentage of gay people than in other locations. I’ve seen this in cities such as San Francisco, LA, Dallas, Houston and even Salt Lake City (which surprised me a bit).

But NYC takes the cake. Maybe even more-so than San Francisco. That’s a toughie. It seems like you either have the rough-and-tough NYC construction worker that has been in a union since the womb (and yes, they are all named Vinnie, Joe, Murray, or Mario), the “Metro” sissy boy (who are really gay and just don’t know it, yet), or the outright flamers. There just isn’t a lot of middle ground here.

The other night me and my co-worker were trying to get to a particular area where they were supposed to have good food and music. The cabbie clearly dropped us in the wrong area and we ended up in the gayborhood which had even more gay people than usual. A big clue was the rainbow flags hung out of all the windows with “NYC” on it, and the guys wearing tight shirts/pants/whatever, walking little foof dogs with high heels on – the guys, not the dogs.

We didn’t find any food or music we were interested in so we made our way across town to a Brazilian BBQ place (think meat, meat and more meat). We walk in and on the big screen TV is some flaming guy talking about something. People…seriously, I need a break. I don’t mind that someone is gay. I even have some gay friends. But I don’t necessarily enjoy being immersed in it 24 x 7.

As I said the other end of the spectrum is the manly-men construction workers. Those guys are freaking hysterical. We have been hanging out in a new building where the guys are working all the time. One group of guys in particular is like watching a comedy routine. And yes, a guy name Mario is the one that is the most stereotypical of the group, and the loudest, and the funniest. Hanging out in the room with those guys is a much needed break from all the flamboyance and metro sissy boys street-side.

Cold Pizza and CableTV

2010-05-26T05:04:00.001-07:00

Last night I was pretty wiped out. I wanted nothing more than to get a good NYC pizza and kick back to watch a flick. I had brought my NetFlix movies with me and was going to watch them.

The first thing I did was hook my laptop up to the TV via an HDMI cable. No problem there, even if the TV couldn’t support the resolution I was using. Then I popped in my BluRay disc and…..nothing. Apparently, the piece of crap software provided by Dell wants to go out to the Internet and download 54MB of updates before it will play a disc. Over my crappy hotel internet connection this just doesn’t work, so it won’t play anything. I fought this for about ½ and hour while my pizza got cold.

Next, I took a non BluRay disc and popped it in hotel provided DVD player. So far so good, until the disc started to pixilate and then stopped working altogether. I popped it out, but it didn’t appear to be particularly dirty or scratched. My guess is that the DVD player is old and abused and has gotten bumped one too many times.

So I resigned myself to watching whatever I could find on the cable channels, eating my cold pizza and having some wine…..

Back in the Big Apple

2010-05-24T04:07:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I returned to NYC for the first time in, I don’t know, at least five years. Maybe longer. It was cloudy when we flew in, but you could still see the urban sprawl going on forever and ever. Sometimes, when we land in DFW I hear people commenting on our urban sprawl, but we have nothing on NYC.

I grabbed a cab and headed into the city to my temporary apartment. I’m going to be here for a month and staying at a hotel that was just big enough to open the door wasn’t really an option. Besides, we lucked out and I found a great place for under $300 a night – in Manhattan that’s almost unheard of.

On the drive in, I again noticed how old everything looked. I always forget how long NYC has been here and that while there are about a billion buildings towering into the sky, most of them are fairly old, not new. The architecture and the clash of architectural styles is always interesting.

Of course, the first thing that really hit me when I got into the city was the smell. Just general food and garbage. Strange. I’m staying roughly at the corner of Third and 37th. I don’t quite have my bearings but I think it’s just at the edge of the Manhattan district because it’s not quite “snooty” yet.

I had a nice Italian dinner and there are plenty of things to eat around here – typical NYC. I crashed early because I was tired, but the sun started coming up at about 4:30am. I lost track of when the sirens and noise stopped – if ever, but they were in full swing by 6:00am. I have a feeling I’ll be tired by the end of the day…..

A Friend's DUI

2010-05-16T11:49:00.003-07:00

Recently, one of my good friends was attending a going away party for another friend of mine. My first friend apparently gets pretty messed up and acts a bit obnoxiously. The other friends offer him a ride home, etc., and of course he declines.

Now, I’ve had to deal with drunks before and I’ve had to deal with this particular friend when he’s been wasted. I have never, not one time had a problem getting his keys from him so he wouldn’t drive home. Sure, he’d give me a bit of shit about it but he always gave them up without any real confrontations.

My other friends say that they “gave him every chance in the world,” etc., but what do they do? They called the cops on him. I couldn’t believe it. I have never even heard of such a thing. So my friend gets a DUI and now is in a pretty hard spot. He’s facing a lot of legal problems, fines, etc.

I was pretty pissed off about it and let my other friend know, in no uncertain terms, that I was not happy and that I thought the situation was handled poorly. Again, they professed that they gave him every chance in the world. I wasn’t there, but I find that really hard to believe. Instead of getting any kind of apology I get a rebuttal about how one guy was hit by a drunk driver and still has problems and how this friend had to deal with an abuse husband, etc. Great. So it sounds like they decided to take their anger out on my friend – and this friend is one of the nicest guys I have ever met. I’ve never even heard him say anything bad about anyone.

The other thing was this whole sense of self-righteousness that I read into it. I’ve hung out with these people before and I’ve seen ALL of them get blitzed. I still can’t believe that they did that. I am still reeling I am so angry over it. I hope one day I am not as angry as I am today because I do value the friendship of this person. Still, right now, I don’t even want to talk to them and I may never get over feeling like I won’t ever want to hang out with them at a party or anything. Who knows when they might decide to call the cops on me for some reason?

It kind of sucks to write off an entire group of friends, but as I was told – they all pretty much agreed to the course of action and upon further debate said they’d do the same thing again. I guess fucking over a friend isn’t that big of a deal to them…..

Getting Fooked in DIA

2010-05-16T11:49:00.001-07:00

I hate flying through Denver. It seems that every time I fly through Denver something happens. Flight is delayed….flight is cancelled….get diverted to alternative airport and then get fooked by something else, etc. In fact, in the last two years I think DIA has a 100% track record for fooking me in some way shape form or fashion.

Today, there are storms in Dallas and it’s screwing up my flights to get home. Now I know you are thinking “That’s not because of DIA!”….but I disagree. It’s a Karma thing, or maybe a conspiracy thing. If I had flown through SLC, there wouldn’t have been storms and I would have made it on time.

Bling! Says it’s because of the Latter Day Saints – the Mormons. But I’m pretty sure that those are the ones in SLC, not DIA. Still, it does kind of play into a nice Jesus Freak conspiracy theory. So do you think there might be something to this? I think it warrants further investigation. We could do some research about it tying in all the Jesus Freaks and how they conspire to screw us non Jesus Freaks up when we travel. We can even call the book “How would Jesus Fly?”

2010-05-16T11:48:00.000-07:00

I took about a month of from writing in here. For those few of you who read this and are interested in keeping up, my apologies. I kind of had a bad snap there with a bunch of things happening at once including another big trip to work out at the power plant. Those trips are brutal – 6 and 7 day work-weeks pulling 15+ hour days.

I also was struggling with the loss of some of my relatives as well as my own personal issues and struggles with death. I am going to be 40 next year. I always wondered if I would have a mid-life "crisis" and I think that in some ways it’s already started. It’s been hard for me to not think about that, but I seem to be getting back to normal.

Since my friend and co-worker quit, I’ve also had to carry his workload and as luck would have it all of our project s are hitting at the same time. To top it off, we also have a lot of customer requests hitting and while they sat there for weeks or months not ready for us to work on their projects they are suddenly all ready. I just can’t keep up.

But!!! I did get a new laptop and it’s pretty sweet. It’s a Dell Studio XPS 16 and it’s totally loaded with features and whizmos!!! Unfortunately, it took me almost three days to totally wipe it out, re-install it the base OS and move all of my files over to it. Why did it take three days? See above – I’ve had NO time to work on it. Last night I stayed up until about midnight so I’d be ready for the work day today. There is nothing like being in the middle of two laptops and you can’t really quite use either one.

As usual, when I don’t write, I’ve had a lot of thoughts and ideas to write about but simply did not feel like getting to it.

However, you might find this interesting –
We have a few systems that monitor client networks. This is a service we provide to them. Last Thursday one of the monitoring systems freaked out and sent out, oh, maybe 1000+ alerts. These alerts come to my inbox in the form of an email. This same email also goes to our trouble ticket system and opens a trouble ticket. When a trouble ticket hits the system, I also get an email.

So right now, that means I am getting at least two emails for each alert – and as I said there was well over 1000 of them.

The initial email was also supposed to go to an old email address for a guy that used to work for us. Let’s say his name was Fred. Our email administrator had just killed his email account. So all mails that were supposed to go to Fred were getting rejected by the email server. The email server would send a notification of the reject out to the ticketing system – generating more tickets, and thus more alert emails to our in-boxes.

So now, figure for each alert I am getting three email – that’s over 3000+ emails. Then, the coup de grace… if a trouble ticket is opened for more than about 15 minutes, it sends and alert to my phone, and then it sends another one 10 minutes later if nobody responds. My phone was hit with god knows how many text messges. It had to be in the thousands. It basically crippled my phone. I had to mute the phone because I was getting a text message on the average of about one every one-to-two seconds. So if people called me I couldn’t tell. When I would try to call out I had to wrestle with the phone since it was constantly alerting me I had a new message, and, oh, did I want to read it right then? If I could get a call out it would beep at me constantly due to the new messages coming in. How long did this last? Until Saturday evening. Roughly 2.5 days.

First Day of Spring?

2010-03-20T11:35:00.001-07:00

Isn’t today supposed to be the first day of spring? It doesn’t much feel like it. Sometime my birthday falls on the first day of spring, but this year it doesn’t. Yesterday was a nice day outside – almost 70, today it’s 37 and raining. I kind of like it. It seems to fit my mood.

One of my great aunts passed away yesterday. She was a pretty interesting person and one of my favorite stories about her was when I was significantly younger – my parents and I were in E. Texas visiting everyone. We were talking to her and the phone started ringing. They didn’t have answering machines or anything fancy and the phone kept ringing. My dad asked, “Are you going to get that?” She simply replied, “No, if it’s important they’ll call back.”

At the time I thought my dad found this amusing and probably thought this was an usual response. I liked it, but at the time couldn’t quite understand why. Later, as I got older, I understood why. Today, most of us still get way too caught up in being connected in some shape or fashion to everything else around us. We take text messages, and phone calls at all hours of the night and day. But I don’t. If I am eating dinner I don’t answer my phone. If I’m having a conversation with someone else or out with friends you won’t find me engrossed in a texting with another friend. Why? Because I’d rather be in the moment with those around me. And my great aunt was very correct – if it’s really important they will call back, and today they can leave you a voice mail.

I always connected with her and I’ll miss her. I can’t make the funeral because it happened too fast and it was being held on short notice in E. Texas. I understand she didn’t want a big funeral and she didn’t want everyone to make a fuss. That sounds like her.

Another one of my great aunts passed away about 2 weeks ago. I wouldn’t say that I felt quite as connected with her even though she was always very kind. She loved having kids around and always made us feel welcome even though we weren’t adults, yet. She was well respected in her church and in the community.

The both lived long and good lives (almost 90 each) and while I am not sad for them, I am sad for myself because I won’t get to see them again and enjoy their company.

My last remaining great aunt has been diagnosed with cancer. The docs give her less than a year to live. We are hoping that she can make it to her 91st birthday and I have a feeling if she does there will be a big celebration. I just saw her and she was as sharp as a tack and in good spirits. She decided she had lived a long life and had done all she could do. She didn’t want chemo, but I think she agreed to some radiation therapy provided that it showed positive results.

And one of my other distant friends was just diagnosed with a rare and aggressive form of brain cancer. He was talking to someone at work, was feeling fine, and then his face went numb. Docs quickly assessed the situation and removed a mass from his brain that they couldn’t identify. They sent it to the mayo clinic and the came back with the bad news. He’s a great guy, wife, kids, etc. He’s going to fight it, and I think he should, but it doesn’t look good. They have given him less than a year to live. I think he is a year younger than I am.

So I’m not in a great mood today. The rain and cold weather are fitting. In a day or two it will be sunny and beautiful. Plants are already blooming and wildlife will be coming out of hibernation. My friend’s daughter is getting married in about a week. I remember when she was a tiny little thing in diapers. It just goes to show us that the cycle of life continues. And while I know this feeling will pass it just doesn’t make me feel any better today.

Minimum Card Charges and Donuts

2010-03-18T12:25:00.002-07:00

I’ve posted before about some of the merchant service agreements with credit card services such as Visa / MasterCard. One of them is that they do not allow a merchant to enforce a minimum charge limit. I’m not saying you won’t see the signs all over the place and that the merchant won’t try to enforce it, but it is against their agreement and they are not supposed to do so.

The other morning I was at a donut shop with my g/f. I was out of cash (rare for me), but she had some. We ordered some breakfast and got her some coffee. It wasn’t much and I noticed they had a $5.00 minimum credit card sign. I whispered “I feel like charging this just to prove a point.” She said “you don’t want to do that.” The problem is, that I very much DID want to do that. I wanted to cause a scene right then and there and to get the bank on the phone that very moment and tell them to shove their donuts up their ass while Visa jumped their shit for violating their terms.

Now, the foreigners at the donut shop didn’t really deserve that. They surely made an honest mistake, but I didn’t care. I wanted things to be right. I’ve always been like that. In school if I was getting expelled that day for wearing a Slayer t-shirt with a pentagram on it I wanted the other kid getting expelled for having a Jesus t-shirt and a cross on it. My father likes to point out that there is a difference between equal opportunity (liberty) and equal outcomes (suppression). Even as a kid I was a big advocate of equal opportunity and fairness. The hard thing is learning that life is not fair…. But I was really pissed about donuts.

Customer Service Sucks

2010-03-18T12:24:00.001-07:00

What is it with customer service lately? You would think that with the economy having problems, consumer confidence down, and companies hurting in general that they would be making more of an effort to keep their customers, not trying to piss them off.

Credit card companies have taken the extra step by charging you more for less. But recently, I’ve had two experiences that could have been better.

When we went to Japan we stayed predominantly in Hilton hotels. We could have chosen other hotels, some costing less money, but chose Hilton to keep accruing points. Besides, the hotels are nice. At any given hotel in Japan I noticed that they didn’t have my Hilton Honors number. They were willing to put in, but I didn’t have it on me, either. In the states this isn’t an issue since I always have my laptop and can easily look it up.

When I got back to the U.S. I sent in a request to get my points. It was denied because I booked through a third party, or it was a discount, or a foreign country, or the moon was full, or any other number of bullshit reasons. I wrote them and tried to politely explain that I wasn’t interested in playing games and defining what a “stay” was. I explained that I slept in their beds, spent my money at their hotel, and as far as I was concerned that was a “stay” regardless of whatever ridiculous conditions they wanted to wrap around it. They responded back with another denial – and more ridiculous citing of rules. I wrote them back and reiterated my first email with a follow up of my money being important to me, I would hope that their customers are important to them.

They finally relented and gave me the points, but really…should I have had to write them three times to get it? No. It should have been a simple one time request. They could have informed me of the rules and permitted the request. That’s poor customer service in my opinion.

The second issue came with United Airlines. I was on a return flight from a trip and ordered a couple of jack and cokes (herein referred to as “cocktails”). They don’t take cash anymore so I had to pay with a credit card. The flight-chick was having problems with the machine and even told me it was trying to overcharge me. The drinks were supposed to cost $6.00 ea. I had my drinks, got my receipt and came home.

On my recent bill I had a charge for $12.00 (2 x cocktails) and another for $24!!! That would be a grand total of $36.00 or six cocktails on a sub 2hour flight – I would have been pretty hammered and probably would have had problems getting off the plane.

You also can’t call UA, so I sent them an email on one of their stupid form thingies. I was nice, explained the discrepancy and asked for a refund of $24 on my credit card. Guess what? DENIED!!! They gave me a $100 voucher for my next flight. WTF? I was not happy – and I had to think “am I cutting off my nose to spite my face?” but, no. It was there are multiple issues here. The primary issue being that they charged me for goods and services I did not receive. The secondary issue is that most of my flight funds are from work, but drink funds are from me. This didn’t put money back in MY pocket. And last, but not least, I shouldn’t be forced to spend more money to get a refund for something I never received in the first place.

I wrote another email to them explaining theses points. Bottom line – if they are going to go to credit card transactions only then they are going to have to deal with these types of events.

A representative called me and we discussed it. She was very polite and in the end I got my $24 back (to show up on a future cc bill) and she gave me the $100 voucher for my troubles. Kudos to her for taking care of the situation, but I still wish that it would have been made right from the start.

Lawnmower Steve

2010-03-18T12:23:00.000-07:00

This isn’t new, and has been on the internet for quite some time. Have you already seen this guy?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNPxIibhcKY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95qZtwJNjxk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fds_hupE2vQ

Sometimes, I think about this and I just crack up. My two favorite things are that he clearly knows his rights, and when (in the second video) he gets tased and screams and finally says “GOD DAMMIT!” I love people like this. This guy is a moron. But we need morons. I need morons. They are my comedic relief when life gets too serious.

Sure there are intelligent people that are funny. And I need them too, but there is just something about someone who completely lacks the fundamental understanding of how to interact with society that I appreciate in my own sick way.

My First Blu Ray Experience

2010-03-18T12:22:00.000-07:00

Other than probably casually seeing some Blu Ray on a TV in a store like Best Buy I’d never really sat down and watched a Blu Ray movie until last night.

My folks had given me little extra scratch as a Christmas present and I’d been wanting to pick up a Blu Ray player for quite some time. If you aren’t aware of what Blu Ray is, it’s the DVD equivalent of High Definition. Output of 1080i / 1080p (depending on the player).

After some research it appears that the Sony PS3 is still considered one of the best players out there as a function of picture quality and bang-for-the-buck. With the PS3 Slim 120 down to $299 you get a lot more function than from other comparable Blu Ray players. In short:

Blu Ray player w/1080i/1080p and BD Live
Video Game Console – and yes the games have HiDef output
Built in networking
Built in WiFi
Connects and plays media from servers (music / video)
And more!

Two minor complaints – it’s a little slow to load, and if you want to use your existing IR universal remote you will have to buy an adapter since the PS3 doesn’t support IR, only Blue Tooth (RF).

I then upgraded my NetFlix account to send me Blu Ray discs “automatically” for movies in my queue if they were available. Due to timing, DirecTV decided to increase their rates and drop all of my promo discounts – my DirecTV bill was now going to be almost $60 a month (almost double what it was)!!! So I cancelled DirecTV.

But last night I popped in one of my new Blu Ray discs from Netflix and fired it up. It only took a few moments to realize what I’d been missing and why I spent all the money I’ve spent on my TV, sound system, etc. It was quite impressive even if the movie wasn’t spectacular. Even the previews were sharp and clear. My other DVD player was an upscaling DVD player and while the picture was good this was far better.

So now I am hooked. If you have a few extra bucks and are looking at Blu Ray you should get one if your system can support it. Look into supporting features like Blu Ray Live (BD Live). You don’t have to spend $300 on a PS3 or other player, but if you were looking in that range I’d consider the PS3

Japan - A Surreal Moment

2010-02-16T22:39:00.001-07:00

Well, I knew I’d forget to write about something. One of the oddest moments we had in Japan was in the Akihabara district of Tokyo. We were a tad lost and trying to find the correct subway rail system. There were people crammed in all over the place and we were in an underground subway.

Suddenly, we could hear singing and we recognized the song. It wasn’t unusual to hear American music in Japan. In fact, we heard more of that than anything else. But this was different. This was the Battle Hymn of the Republic… being sung in by a bunch of very high voices that sounded like the Chipmunks, with a Japanese accent.

My g/f and I just looked at each other and we both could see the “WTF” look in each other’s eyes. It was pretty surreal…

Japan - I'm Back!!

2010-02-16T12:56:00.006-07:00

I’m actually still reeling from jet lag. For some reason, I can always travel west far easier than I can travel east. When I’ve gone to Europe it’s always harder for me to adjust. The same is true about coming home from Japan.

Going over there wasn’t really a problem. We flew business class (on miles) on a Boeing 777. The new cabins are pretty slick and it made the 12+ hour flight pretty enjoyable. We had to get a connecting leg in LA, so our total trip time was almost 20 hours by the time we caught our flights, busses, etc., and got to the hotel. Still, I adjusted to that fairly quick and within a day or two was pretty much on-track with the exception that I was getting up and going to bed fairly early.

Coming home, though, hasn’t worked out so well. Japan is approximately 13 hours ahead of DFW. From a time difference perspective we left Japan before we landed in DFW. The flight was also shorter since we flew direct to DFW and we had the jet stream with us (700+mph ground speed!! Nice tailwind) and were going against the rotation of the earth. Oddly enough, we landed in the biggest “snow storm” on record at DFW. Of course, we love the snow but everyone else on the plane and most people in DFW were freaked out about it. All in all, we got about 12.5” – highly unusual for us and it caused some damage with breaking branches and what-not. Here is a quick pic of my house with snow all over it.

By the time we got through customs and got a ride home from the airport it was about 10:30 or so in the morning and we had already been up for a long time. I don’t sleep well on flights even with the free-flowing Jack and cokes. I was pretty wiped out, but managed to stay up until about 3:00pm and then I crashed for an hour or so. I got up and then stayed up until midnight. But this morning I woke up promptly at 4:00am and was really dragging by 4:00pm. I took another “quick nap” and woke up almost 7 hours later and here I am writing at near midnight.
I figure I’ll just be a train wreck for a few days but I’ll get over it and it was totally worth it. Besides, I have over 1338 emails to go through only 25 of which are spam. That, plus laundry, organizing photos, gifts, thoughts, etc. is just going to take a while.

Japan - I'm Back Pt. 2

2010-02-16T12:56:00.005-07:00

I wrote that after only being in town for a day or so. I’ve been home for several days, now and have almost got my jet lag under control. I’ve also finished my write up on Japan. I’m sure I’ve forgotten something or left something out. If you want to read it it’s all posted below. If you just want to skip to the pictures, click here.

Japan - The Prequel

2010-02-16T12:55:00.002-07:00

As you can tell by the previous post Japan Bitches! We were scrambling to get things organized and done. One of the problem with both of us working so much right at the end was that neither of us had much time to organize and coordinate planning a 2 week international trip.

We had some help planning the trip from friends and acquaintances that live in Japan and the JTB travel guides were really quite nice even if we had some communications difficulties due to the language barrier.

Still, I felt just a little ill-prepared going over with the attitude that I’d figure some things out while I was there and that just the way it was going to have to be. I made my g/f promise that she wouldn’t show up at 2:00am the day we were supposed to leave with her hair on fire and completely stressed out. She kept it by showing up at 2:00am without her hair on fire and other than being tired she wasn’t too stressed. It was about 3:00am when we got in bed, leaving about 1.5 hours to sleep before we had to get up at 4:30am. I had a private car coming to take us to the airport – I figured we deserved it and I wasn’t about to try to mooch a ride to the airport off of someone at 5:30am.

My g/f was going over to Japan initially for work so we met her father at the airport in the Admiral’s club (international travel in business class gets access!) and sort of chilled in a zombie-like state until it was time for our flights. I showed my g/f a 747 and we talked about them for a while – little did we know this would foreshadow for what was to come.

We also jumped on the Internet kiosks and made an effort to reserve our ski and snowboard gear once we got to Niseko. Working with the Japanese web sites can be fairly difficult because it’s a mixture of Japanese and really fucked up “Engrish.” We were pretty sure we got our reservations made, but they had to confirm them so all we could do now was wait.

Unfortunately, in making the reservations my g/f had taken her little tiny bag that holds her credit cards and driver’s license up to the kiosk. The bag is black, the countertops are black – you can see where this is going and we realized she had left them behind once we landed in LA. Not much we could do about it at that point so she started calling to cancel her cc’s prior to the next flight. I told her not to sweat it and that I still had my cc’s and plenty of cash.

And finally, we were on our way…..

Japan - Misplaced Health Concerns

2010-02-16T12:54:00.001-07:00

One thing we felt that the Japanese are a little off on are their health concerns. You see a good portion of the population wearing air filter masks. You also see them use wet-naps prior to every meal and they are fanatical about taking your shoes off and wearing slippers inside the house, hotel, or restaurant. If you go to the bathroom they even have a different pair of slippers to wear.

When I was going through the airport I would take my shoes off due to them being steel toed and heeled. I know they would set off the metal detectors so I just took them off. The security folks would force me to wear slippers. I kept trying to tell them that I didn’t want them, but they were very insistent about it.

So my question is, how is slipping on a pair of slippers that everyone has had their feet in any more or less clean than me just walking 10 feet in my socks?

When you hit a public restroom don’t expect anything to dry your hands with. There might be an air dryer, but I only saw one public restroom the entire time that had paper towels. Soap was 50 / 50. Due to all of this, most guys didn’t wash their hands after using the bathroom. My g/f says that the women’s bathrooms were no better and often didn’t have any toilet paper. She also said the Japanese style toilets often times had some type of liquid substance all over and around them – and then no soap or towels.

In the U.S. we know that washing your hands is one of the single best defenses against becoming ill. Not masks, and not taking your shoes off. We just found it a bit odd.

Japan - Chillin' in Tokyo

2010-02-16T12:10:00.004-07:00

You’ve probably heard that things are a little more expensive in Japan. That is true to an extent, but our first experience was Tokyo. In some ways this was good because big cities are similar the world over and it was a good way to ease into being in a foreign country.

Things aren’t much worse in Tokyo than they are in NYC as far as expense goes. If you go to Manhattan, NY it’s pretty expensive. It’s about the same in Japan but they don’t tip – it’s already included in the price. That helps. Of course, as you wander around you do come across the oddball things like the $100+ cantaloupe, but this was not the norm.

I also ended up ordering a $25.00 Jack and Coke by accident. The night we arrived it was really late when we got to the hotel and I was fried. We were at the bar at the hotel and I didn’t even think to ask what the cost would be. It’s always a little more expensive at the hotel bars, but when we got the tab there was shock and amazement all around at the cost of my Jack and Coke. My g/f is not letting me forget that a self-proclaimed cheap bastard ordered a $25 Jack and Coke.

My g/f had business meetings the first few days we were there so I was left to explore on my own. My first real experience on my own was walking out of the hotel lobby early in the morning to find some coffee (for my g/f) and a coke for myself. Most hotels in Japan included some type of kettle for making hot water and tea bags. There wasn’t much in the way of coffee in the rooms and I don’t drink coffee so we took the streets most mornings trying to find that vital sustenance to wake up with.

As I left the hotel and hit the streets I noticed that there weren’t that many people out and about. It was still early, but back home in a big city there would have already been throngs of people. A younger couple turned towards me, laughed and ran off. I couldn’t tell if it was because of me or something else. Regardless, I was on my way exploring.

Tokyo is a huge city – about the size of the entire DFW metroplex and it is home to over thirty-million Japanese. That’s more people than the entire state of TX. It’s pretty much wall-to-wall people wherever you go and at almost any time of day or night – except the mornings. It seems like they like to get going a little bit later than we do, but they also seem to work later in the evening. For that reason, we didn’t find much to eat for breakfast except at the hotels. There was a Denny’s across the street and while none of us wanted to eat there, the $30 breakfast buffet at the hotel was a bit much so we tried it out. Check out the section on eating in Japan.

As I said it was pretty much wall-to-wall people. Especially if you visited a market place or alley. While these were great to experience, I quickly found myself wanting to get out of the crowds, though you could buy just about anything there:

Our hotel room in Tokyo was large, especially by Japanese standards of which we would later find out. They are also fond of their heated toilet seats and fancy bidets / showers, etc. This one had a seat warmer, a “shower” for the front or back, and a pulsing water option. I found some later that also had a “no odor” option. Aside from spraying an entire bathroom wall with jetting water as I was trying to figure these things out I sort of came to like them.

Our first bathroom was also built into telephone-booth-style stalls. I don’t think the photo could capture it very well, but the doors on both the stalls were hinged like a phone booth and you did your business (whether shower or bathroom) in one of them.

All of this was odd as we quickly found out that the public restrooms often did not have soap, toilet paper, or anything to dry your hands with.

But one thing I was very impressed with while in Japan is their attention to detail. No matter what they did, no matter how menial, they took great pride in their work and did it with enthusiasm. Only once or twice did we come across anyone who didn’t seem to care to be at their job. As a result, they kick our ass in certain things, little things, like this control panel in the hotel room – alarm clock, and lighting controls all right by the bed. This was not unusual in any of the rooms we stayed in.

I also found their elevators to be smooth as glass. So smooth that you might not have realized that the elevator begun to move. Even the leveling at the landings was extremely smooth and controlled. But it didn’t stop there. It was at nearly every level of their products, culture, infrastructure, etc.

Here is a picture of a bathroom mirror. They heat them up over the sink so that they don’t fog and you can continue to shave or get ready after stepping out of the shower (note the socks hanging to dry!):

As I was saying, my g/f and her dad had business to do so I was pretty much on my own to wander the streets of Tokyo for a few days. I walked every day for several hours and really enjoyed it. It was quite cool in Tokyo but only “cold” on a handful of days. The Japanese were dressed fairly warm with heavy coats, sweaters, scarves, and other items. One thing about the Japanese is that they apparently like it really warm once they get inside somewhere. Everywhere we went we would start sweating almost immediately upon entering a building of any type. We would be stripping our jackets and things off and the locals would stay bundled up. This got old really fast as I was constantly sweating and felt icky on most days and in need of an extra shower. I had brought mostly warm clothes since I knew it was supposed to be cold, but I really didn’t need them in Tokyo and found it difficult to dress so that I would be cool indoors and warm outdoors.

Everyone in Japan was extremely friendly even if we couldn’t easily communicate. They are a very humble and proud people and always willing to help out. Most of the communication we did was visual, especially if we didn’t speak the same language. Finger pointing and gesturing went a long way with just a few words of Japanese or “Engrish” between us.

Tokyo was also very clean in spite of the large number of people that were all over the place. I think part of this is due to Japanese culture and the fact they just take a lot of pride in their country and where they live. Here are a few quick shots just to show you the city a bit:

And of course, enter The Matrix:

At the parks it was interesting that there were these huge freaking cats everywhere. They seemed pretty nonplussed by us, but I wasn’t so sure about them. I had visions of trying to explain to people that I was mugged by a cat while walking through a park in Tokyo.

A Japanese duck – note the slightly slanted eyes eyes:

The Emperor’s palace is in Tokyo. It’s moved a few times, but currently resides there. I took a few quick shots as close as I was allowed to get to it. It’s kind of cool because it’s surrounded by moats.

Japan - Snowboading in Niseko - The Sickest of the Sick!

2010-02-16T11:58:00.004-07:00

We left Tokyo and headed to Niseko, on the Hokkaido island. We had heard that they get consistent and reliable powder and I was dying to get some runs in and check this out. Leaving Tokyo was a little sketchy because we were now completely on our own and had to switch trains, catch flights, busses and other forms of transportation.

We grabbed a train to the airport and only had a little difficulty putting all of that together. Supposedly the rush hour was supposed to be over, but it was still pretty packed. Once we got to the airport we whizzed right through security. They were some of the nicest and friendly people I’ve ever had to deal with.

We showed no ID, ever. We also were not required to remove our liquids or our shoes (though I knew mine would set off the metal detectors so I did anyway). There was no rudeness or people on power-trips. We simply got through security efficiently and without any problems.

On the flight, it was again stuffy. I never quite figured it out, but the Japanese are just not into having air flowing. They seem to like it stuffy and hot and I was freaking dying on the plane, but at least it was only a 1 hr. flight. Something they did that I thought was really cool is that they show a forward facing camera on the big screens during take off. Once the gear is up, it switches to a downward facing camera until it’s time for the in-flight entertainment. Upon landing, the sequence is reversed. I really enjoyed that and wished we did it here in the U.S.

After landing in New Chitose we met up with a representative of the travel company and got on the right bus. For some reason we thought it was only a 45 minute bus ride. Fortunately we found out it was close to 2.5 hours. This gave us a chance to grab some chips to take on the bus as we were close to starving at this point. It also would have completely freaked us out to have not stopped after an hour and we’d have been wondering if we were even in the right place.

But we made it to Niseko and I was amazed at how much snow there was. Granted, I haven’t been all over the world in the winter, and I’ve experienced some good hard dumps in MT, WY, UT, and CA, but this was like nothing I’d ever seen. It was dumping snow when we arrived and it pretty much didn’t stop for the entire three days we were there. Morning, noon and night it dumped snow.

We walked down to the main village to get a bite to eat. We were really starving at this point and saw a pizza joint so we stopped in and ordered a pizza. The guy making the pizza came out to ask us how we wanted the tomatoes done – cooked in or put on top after? We said cooked in and it was an awesome pizza.

The guy’s name was Rob – like the bank – and was a very friendly guy. He said he was from Alaska and was very adamant to point out that it was not part of the U.S. He was very disgruntled with American politics. When I asked him why he left the U.S. he said because of George Bush. I had to commend him. He is the first and only person I ever met that put their money where there mouth is and followed through with leaving the country after Bush got re-elected.

There is a fire hydrant buried somewhere under there…

Me in front of a sign for a restaurant…

There was so much snow in fact that some of the folks had taken to using snow blowers to get it off the roof. I wasn’t sure which was more amusing, that there was that much snow, or that it was such a common occurrence that getting the snow blower up there didn’t seem to be a problem.

At some point we decided that this would be the 9th Circle of Hell for our friend Bling! so we just started snapping pics of the snow for him.

The ice bar…

We stayed at a nice little bed and breakfast called Locomotion. It wasn’t anything grandiose, but it had a warm shower, was cozy, and all we really needed after a day on the slopes. A view from our window:

Note the snow drift on the left side of the pic…here is what it looked like from inside the room:

We used the snow as a refrigerator at the B&B where we stayed:

Did I mention that this was a room on the second floor? Look again… I’m telling you it was sick.

We finally hit the slopes and it was awesome! As I said, it never really stopped snowing so there was fresh powder and TONS of it everywhere you went – even on the groomers, though you couldn’t tell they were groomed because of all the fresh powder.

Niseko is also largely built up from the Aussies and Kiwis so just about everyone speaks English and you will hear a lot of accents and see more Caucasians than anywhere else. But I gotta tell ya, the Aussies are wusses when it comes to the cold. It was about 15 F, when we got there and they were already complaining how cold it was. “Going to be a lot colder tomorrow!” “really? How cold” “-15 or so.” That is -15 Celsius, which is about 5 Fahrenheit. My cut-off for boarding is about -10 or so Fahrenheit. We did see -22 Celsius up towards the top, which is almost -10 Fahrenheit. I was still OK with that, but it was definitely getting colder. Still I got tired of hearing them whinge about the cold over and over again.

We hit a good warm-up run and my g/f said her legs were already tired and she didn’t want to kill them so I should take a run on my own. No problem! Up I went and I lucked out as the sun broke free of the clouds and I was able to take black runs all the way down the mountain in the deep powder. It was awesome and one of the best runs I had the entire time as my legs were fresh, the powder was largely untracked and deep, and the sun was shining, but only briefly. It was quickly obscured by clouds again.

In fact, one of the few times the sun came out and it quit snowing we realized we were on the other side of a valley from another mountain / volcano! We had no idea it was there. This sequence of pictures was taken in the span of about 10 minutes:

By the time this next photo was taken you can see that the clouds were already backing in and within a couple of minutes the view was gone again:

At times, the snow was almost overpowering. We went up to the near top of the mountain and the winds picked up and started blowing like crazy. It was getting under our helmets and through our goggles and making my head literally hurt from how cold it was. The visibility dropped and once we got off the lift I was literally almost blown over by how strong the wind was. Visibility reduced to about 10 yards, and I don’t mean it was good visibility. There was a warming hut about 30 or 40 yards away that would “disappear” and we’d have to wait for the wind and snow to die down so we could find it. Even at 10 yards you had to be careful because you couldn’t see very well. We waited most of that one out in the hut and warmed up enough to trek across the mountain to the other side and skied / boarded down. Once at the bottom we stopped to get a beer. Here is a view from the window:

Can you see the huge lift towers? Same view a few minutes later:

That’s why I don’t have many pics of us actually hitting the runs. Visibility was poor and the poor camera was having problems with the cold. I would like to see Niseko on a bluebird day, but we simply didn’t have that many days to hang out. The second day of boarding I got my g/f to go up and try the black under the chairlift. She did OK even though she had a nice yard sale and a face plant.

I know it’s not a great pic, but we just never had good visibility during the day.

Most of the time you couldn’t see the valley floor at all and it was very flat light which made it difficult. For that reason, we tried out the night skiing.

Again, this was totally sick. The lights put great shadows on the slopes and you could read the runs!! We were able to ski / board harder and faster than at any other time and because it was at night most people were gone. Wide open powder fields were all mine and I conquered them in the same clumsy fashion as I do any other deep powder run. There was even enough light to run trees, though I was a lot more cautious because it quickly got dark in the tree line out of the lights. I am now hooked on night skiing and if I ever have an option to do it when there is a flat-light day I am going to save up for the night skiing.

I would love to go back there some day and spend about a week snowboarding. It was our understanding that this is consistent and reliable year after year. None of this taking a trip and worrying about there being snow stuff. Just go an enjoy deep powder. We were there when they are averaging over 155+ inches of snow. During the peak season they get even more. Nice.

I almost forgot, in Niseko we saw food vans and busses. These were converted vans or busses that they served food out of. The g/f got a crepe from a school bus…

Japan - Sapporo and the Snow Festival

2010-02-16T11:50:00.004-07:00

From Niseko we headed to Sapporo to check out the snow festival. We got on the bus for another long ride. This time there were some more Europeans on the bus and like us, they quickly became hot because once again it was stuffy and there was no air moving. They managed to crack one of their windows open about an inch. As we traveled it got colder and colder and when we stopped for a bathroom break they decided to close the window – only it was now frozen open.

Several people including the driver tried to close the window without any luck. The driver even got a can of de-icer and sprayed it everywhere but it didn’t work. Without a word he went back to the front of the bus and when he returned he had a small blow-torch. I’m not kidding. He lit it and proceeded to heat the window frame for a few minutes. We thought this was hysterical and were getting a good laugh out of it, but it worked and he got the window closed.

When we arrived in Sapporo there wasn’t that much snow and I remarked to my g/f that they should have had the festival in Niseko. Little did I know I’d eat those words later. Our hotel was fairly nice, but it was very hot in the room. I cranked the AC down but nothing happened. I guess they just turn it off in the winter time. Again, it was very stuffy and very uncomfortable. Temp wise, it was the worst stay we had the entire time.

The hotel had some tv guides / brochures for “non-theraputic” massages. I should have got a picture of these, but I didn’t think they would show up very well. It was fairly evident that you could get a happy ending in that town without any problems. I found this a bit strange that the hotel would carry the ads since it was a fairly nice and upscale kind of place. But they even ad some good ads for Japanese porn on the TV:

We took off and headed for the snow festival. It wasn’t any colder than when we were in Niseko, but we weren’t dressed as warmly and quickly found ourselves freezing. Still we checked out a few block’s worth of the sculptures before heading back to the hotel for a good dinner (see the crab feast!).

The next day we only had a few hours, but it was plenty of time to check out the snow festival, and we were dressed a lot warmer. Here are some pics from the festival – some of the sculptures took several months and umpteen dump trucks of snow to build.

Here is part of a sculpture:

And to give you an idea of how big it really was:

Here is some more of the same sculpture:

And the whole sculpture:

This was one of my g/f’s favorites:

A castle made of ice:

And a handful of Japanese oddities:

The even liked Tigger:

And boy, did it ever start snowing. Mostly it was just cold and lightly snowing but after emerging from a basement bar from lunch it was pounding snow. That’s me standing on the street corner after walking in the snow for maybe 5 or 10 minutes.

From Sapporo we headed back to Tokyo for about a day and a ½ before moving on to Kyoto. We were supposed to fly on an Airbus, which I am not fond of. As it turns out, we both had our first flight on a 747. They use a lot of 747’s in Japan. This one was a 747-400 and had a 400+ passenger configuration. We got lucky and had one of the only rows with a spare seat. Again, no air and it was stuffy.

I was glad to get some down time in Tokyo. At that point I needed the break as I had been walking or snowboarding for over a week straight and my old ankle injury was really starting to give me a fit.

Japan - Kyoto

2010-02-16T11:42:00.005-07:00

We took the Shinkansen (bullet train) from Tokyo to Kyoto. I think the train was a 700 series train and they are capable of traveling at speeds up to 177mph. I don’t think we ever went quite that fast, but I’m guessing we were doing about 130mph on the average.

When I was taking those pics they came on the PA and announced in English – “Please stand back.” I thought that was amusing because while I was on the rail, I wasn’t leaning over it or anything.

Kyoto is a very interesting city and well worth the visit. It is a very old city and a lot of the Japanese culture, religion and superstition stems from Kyoto. We really didn’t have enough time there and were only able to see a few of the city's great highlights and features.

We did manage to take a small tour and visit a few really cool places like the Nijo Castle. This place was built in 1603. That makes it a tick over 400 years old as of this writing. The castle was used by the Shogun and it was a really beautiful work of architectural art and engineering. One of the things we thought was really cool was the “nightingale” floors which they used as a security measure in case someone was creeping in the castle late at night. Check out the video on this page and you’ll hear what it sounded like to walk on the floor. http://www.zen-garden.org/html/page_nightingalefloor.htm

We weren’t allowed to take photographs inside the castle, and I’m not sure how the folks in the above link got the video. They might have been sneaky about it or it might have been before they disallowed photography. In any case, here are a few quick shots:

The main gate:

The entryway into the interior:

And the main building:

Please understand that these photos do not do it justice. The buildings are enormous and inside are some beautiful paintings on the walls. This is also only one of several buildings on the grounds.

Next we went to go see the Golden Pagoda, which is really covered in gold leaf:

And the 400+ year old Bonzai tree that was planted by a Shogun:

And then we visited the old Imperial Palace before it moved to Tokyo. This part of the tour was a bit odd because they made us line up in four lines of 11 people to enter the palace. They didn’t seem to care if we stayed in those lines, but we had to do it to get through the gate. Once in, we walked around the grounds and were constantly watched by police and guards – sort of like the secret service. We were not allowed to enter any of the buildings nor were we allowed in many of the courtyard areas that were reserved for ceremony and royalty.

The original palace was only supposed to be in one place, but it burned down so many times they finally said “fuck it” and changed the location. BTW – it takes them 27 years to replace all the roofs of the palace!!!

We also hit an arts and crafts center where we picked up some souvenirs for people and also picked up some nice artwork for ourselves. We hadn’t done much shopping up to this point because we were traveling so much and didn’t have a lot of space.

Here is a pic of the main station building in Kyoto. Unfortunately this doesn’t do it justice. The building is huge both inside and out and has a fairly open architecture. Our hotel was in the building as well as the train station, a mall, etc.

If you look closely you can see a lot of various design elements in the building – some of which don’t go together at all. It was the same inside and at one point I joked that I could see a conference room full of bickering architects and the lead project guy calming them all down by saying something like “no…no….everyone will get to have their input.” And that is what it looked like…a mix-match of elements and styles that was loosely coordinated.

After leaving Kyoto we got back on the Shinkansen and headed back to Tokyo for a brief dinner, a chocolate covered waffle, and a quick stop at a local and traditional Japanese store for writing and stationary. Then it was on to Narita for our last night before coming home.

Japan - Everything is a Bit Smaller

2010-02-16T11:38:00.004-07:00

No trick photography here. The beer was really that small, and that was about a $9 beer. As I mention somewhere else, you really needed to stay away from anything imported if you wanted to keep the costs down.

Here is a picture of me waiting for an elevator at a hotel:

Japanese people are smaller than Americans in general. I’m about 5’6” without any shoes on, so figure that with shoes I’m about 5’7”. The fact that I’m flat-footed and able to touch the ceiling in there should give you an idea of how small some of the places are. Not all of them, but some of them.

The younger generations of Japanese are taller than their previous generations. I was a bit taller than the average young Japanese person, but there were definitely some that were taller than me. The older generation was so short that sometimes we thought they were kids until we could see their face. I’m not kidding. Some of the women didn’t even come up to my shoulders. We speculated that this had more to do with the introduction of more meat and protein in their diet over the last 30 years or so.

My g/f’s father is 6’5” and fairly broad shouldered. He stuck out a like a…well, like a Gaijin in a sea of Japanese. If we got separated in a market or subway, it wasn’t hard to pick him out and find him again.

They just aren’t a very large people – we didn’t see many fat bastards. A few, but not many. And there are a bunch of Japanese in a very small space (like Tokyo) so you just have to get used to being a little packed in (restaurants, trains, etc.). Surprisingly enough, while we say plenty of scooters there weren’t a lot of tiny little cars like you see in Europe. Not that the cars were huge, they just weren’t dinky little cars like I thought I’d see.

Japan - Dining

2010-02-16T07:09:00.007-07:00

Eating in Japan is an experience. We were fortunate enough to have some very nice meals with people that we knew or sort-of knew in Japan. In most cases, they were very eager to please and proud of their cuisine to the point that they often would not even ask us what we wanted to eat and they would just order the most expensive thing on the menu. That turned out to not be so good all of the time.

My g/f is mostly a vegetarian – not for health reasons so much as for ethical reasons. There are certain things she pretty much will not eat and things like beef, pork, chicken, and even some fish isn’t on the menu if you can’t show that it came from an organic farm where the animals were raised and treated well. The Japanese aren’t exactly known for their ethical treatment of animals as they consume a lot of endangered species and have pretty much fished out their oceans. Even now, they are fighting with political groups that want to ban Bluefin Tuna because it is becoming endangered to the point of extinction.

We found that the Japanese diet, at least what you could see of it, was a pretty standard fare of fish / seafood with some type of rice or noodle (or both) and usually some type of soup that is made during the cooking process. There wasn’t a lot of variance in this like there is in the U.S. You could find an Italian restaurant here and there, and there were some fast food places like McDonalds, but for the most part the food was pretty much the same everywhere we went. For my g/f this made eating a somewhat daunting in difficult process. In some cases, she ended up eating things she wouldn’t normally eat either out of politeness or to put food in her stomach. Many a day or evening we tried to make mental notes of places that looked like they had something she could eat.

Surprisingly enough, we couldn’t find a lot of meals with a bunch of veggies. In the U.S. most Japanese meals have a bunch of veggies, but there it was mostly sushi-type stuff and not many veggies. The few times we got veggies she was pretty happy because that is the mainstay of her diet.

Me? I pretty much eat anything. I always find it interesting when people call me a picky eater because I pretty much don’t like foods with a lot of saucy type crap on them and I don’t care for beans or really bitter veggies. But let’s see you eat some of the things I ate in Japan and in other parts of the world…. So eating in Japan wasn’t hard for me even if it was a lot of the same types of food.

In Tokyo we had dinner with Mitsubishi. It was our first full day in Tokyo and thus our first real Japanese dinner. Mitsubishi took us to a really nice restaurant where we had a traditional shabu-shabu dish. Again, they didn’t really ask us what we wanted and only discussed what we were about to order when we asked. For this meal they served about 6 courses. The first course was an appetizer course consisting mostly of some type of sushi. My appetizer plate had whole, uncooked smelt on it (think sardines), some other forms of sushi that I couldn’t identify and a giant snail. I thought my g/f was going to lose it when one of the Mitsubishi guys politely offered his snail to her “Here, I’ve had this before…you should try.” This wasn’t like escargot where they cook it and sauté it in garlic and butter. It wasn’t raw and slimy, but it wasn’t cooked much either. She ate it and managed to choke it down with her beer.

While we were eating our appetizers the servants put a large pot of broth on the built-in cooking surface of the table. The women serving the food were all dressed in traditional kimonos and unlike American dinning they assist you through cooking the meal at the table. Then they brought out the huge plates of raw beef to cook in the now simmering broth on our table. I thought she was going to die. The beef is sliced very thin and you basically grab a piece with your chopsticks and stick it in the boiling water for a few moments before you pull it out, dip it in your bowl of light sauce / spices and then consume it.

It was a lot of meat, and she only ate about a slice of it. Now, while this was going on, the servants were stocking the broth with veggies, rice cakes, and other goodies. Our next course was the broth and veggies along with some small ramen type noodles. After we ate all of this a large bowl of soba noodles was brought out and we consumed that. Now that we were completely stuffed they brought out the desert, which consisted of fresh fruit that was delightful.

But things didn’t get a lot better. My g/f was pretty much starving the next morning and we were trying to avoid the $30 breakfast buffet. Here are some shots of the Denny’s menu that we hit in Tokyo. Note that most of the meals include a salad. This seemed to be typical of a Japanese breakfast though we didn’t see them eating salads at any other time of the day unless it was a seaweed salad or something other than lettuce.

I tried this breakfast and it was OK, except the bean-things. I’m not sure what they were for sure, but I’m not a big of beans anyway.

While I was wandering around on my own I found a little noodle house in a back alley somewhere and had this for about $9 USD….

Sorry the photo is blurry but I was trying to take it without the flash and without drawing too much attention to myself. I have no idea what I ordered because I couldn’t read the menu:

What I can tell you is that it was very tasty. The main bowl is some type of spicy soup with noodles and baby octopus in it. There were other things in there that I couldn’t identify so who knows what I ate? It was also served with rice, dumplings, what I think was pears and peaches, and some type of dried fruit like a date.

The following day one her dad’s good friend Mr. Nisho (sp?) or Nisho-san took us to the fish market which was a real culture shock to us.

He took us to a hole in the wall sushi place off the beaten path that was serving fresh sushi from the market. This place might have been 250 sq. feet. Maybe. As Americans we were pretty big compared to everyone else and we had to squeeze in at the sushi bar. We were literally shoulder to shoulder and our host ordered the most expensive thing on the menu which was a fairly varied and eclectic combination of sushi including at least the following: tuna, yellow tail or snapper, raw eel, raw shellfish, raw sea urchin (uni), octopus, and some soup.

I might have ordered something slightly different as I know I don’t like some of those things. For my g/f I would have ordered very specific things for her, but it was too late and would have been insulting. So we ate what was placed in front of us, and in a couple of cases we traded some things – like the uni, which I can’t stand. That was acceptable.

The Japanese eat very fast and they eat sushi with their fingers. Don’t expect to see a lot of chopstick usage at the sushi house. I was about ½-way through mine and our host was done while some other groups and come in, ate, and already left.

My g/f was really struggling so I gave her anything of mine that she liked and she drank the miso soup. Still it was a tough meal for her. Later she said she was tired of looking at eyeballs looking back at her and I said there weren’t any eyeballs, and she said “no, the pink thing had eyeballs.” “are you sure,” I asked. “I’m sure.”

The next day our friend Hisashi took us to an out-of-the-way restaurant in the Akihabara district of Tokyo. This is kind of the east side of Tokyo and has a ton of shopping and electronic stuff. He treated us to lunch at a 200 year old restaurant that as been run by the same family for generations. Not a 200 year old building. A 200 year old restaurant.

The only thing on the menu? Cooked eel. They serve it teriyaki style over a bed of rice with soup and pickled veggies. My g/f ate it and said it wasn’t that bad. I ate all of mine and thought it was delicious. If you have ever had cooked eel nagiri style (sushi) you have an idea of what we ate.

Everyone told us we had to try the crab once we got to Saporro as it was in season. I talked with the folks at the hotel and got a lead on some crab houses. We weren’t sure which one was the best one to go to so we asked the bar staff at the hotel bar. They didn’t speak English too well so it was a bit of a struggle to communicate with them, but they all unanimously picked the same place to eat so that is where we decided to go. It was one of the best meals we had on the trip. The crab was served sukiyaki style. This is very similar to the shabu-shabu style we had earlier.

We sat on the floor without shoes on and managed to place an order by pointing as nobody spoke any English at the restaurant. We finally got our order in and the girl asked for how many people and we said “two” holding our fingers up. “One?” she would ask with her finger up (not that one!)? No, no…”two.” “One?” “two! Two!” holding more fingers up. She finally said OK (I think) and was off. Later on we would realize why she kept asking us if it was for two.

The meal started with appetizer of crab tofu….

And then the appetizer continued with both cooked crab….

And then some raw crab. This was one of the few things I really didn’t like and only ate a little of it. My g/f couldn’t eat it at all after trying a tiny bite. I was kind and tried to warn her when I thought it was something she wouldn’t like, but she was still willing to try it.

BTW – these are single portions and we each had one…

Next was the main course of veggies, more crab, and soup….. you would simply add the veggies and crab to the soup dish and cook it for a bit before using a ladel and / or chopsticks to scoop it out and eat it.

The carnage…..(note that there was another course of stuffed crab somewhere in there).

And just when we thought we were done they whipped up a rice porridge so we then ate that..

…and then there was desert!!! I don’t think I could move after that. We finally realized why she kept asking if we wanted two instead of one.

Paying for the meal was funny because we simply had difficulty communicating with the waitress. She was trying to tell us there was only one place to pay, on the first floor, and we kept trying to give her money. We eventually figured it out. Of course, like a chip off the old block, I had my 10% off coupon and that was a good thing as the meal was roughly $70 ~ $80 / plate. Dad would be proud:

BTW – here are a couple of pics of the crabs in the atriums ponds / tanks:

And this isn’t a great pic, but if you let your eyeballs relax you can see the huge crab bastard in the corner of the tank. He had to be at least 18” or more across.

Fortunately, we also found a few Italian type places here and there and my g/f was able to find some food to eat:

In Niseko we ended up eating a lot of noodles from the quick-mart type store. We’d grab that, a bottle of cheap wine, and go back to our room to eat. It was a nice change from all the fish and stuff that we were getting everywhere else.

One of the other great meals we had was when our friend and her business associate Daisuke took us to a bar he would frequent. We had trouble finding bars. You just don’t see them there like you do in the U.S. Sure, there were plenty of places to go in and have a drink, but they were mostly restaurants. I found this odd because being in the big cities like Tokyo and Sapporo you would think bars would be everywhere, but they weren’t.

We asked Daisuke about this and he said he would take us to a bar upon our return trip to Tokyo. He picked us up at our hotel and we walked through some sketchy neighborhoods to arrive at a very tiny bar. This bar was normally closed on Sunday, but Daisuke told the bartender that we were important clients from the U.S. and that he wanted to impress us so the bartender opened the bar up just for us!! Try to find that in the U.S.!!

The bar was very tiny and packed full of stuff:

We saddled up to the bar and had introductions with the bartender who spoke no English. Daisuke translated everything for us. Here is a picture of us with Daisuke:

The bartender was a really nice guy and he was very proud to have us in his bar. He was a career bartender. None of this working his way through college crap. He had apprenticed under another guy who was noted as one of the first professional bartenders in Japan.

We discovered from talking to him that he’d been doing this a long, long, time and that Daisuke had been going there since he was 15, when his father took him. I asked if they had a lot of walk-in customers or more generally what was business like. I was told that this guy’s clientele were fairly specific and that if he didn’t know you he was likely to turn you away at the door. He said he would remember us, though, and we would always be welcome in his bar.

He made a very nice and very traditional meal for us:

Clock-wise from top-left: pickled veggies like a salad, pickled plumbs (very sweet), seaweed, chicken, egg-patty, ham, shrimp, raw scallop, raw whole squid, and an egg that had been pickled (?) in raw miso for a few days.

During the course of the meal he was vey attentive and seemed to appreciate watching us eat and asking us questions as we also asked him questions. He also made drinks non-stop for us but we never ordered them. He would just make something that inspired him from talking to us. Here is a picture of him with a painting that one of his customers did for him – he’s depicted in the painting.

Towards the end of our trip, while we were in Kyoto we found a few noodle houses that my g/f seemed to like so we hit them a couple of times:

Japan - Japanese Fashion

2010-02-16T07:07:00.005-07:00

The Japanese are a lot more fashionable than we are. A lot of this stems from their culture, especially with regards to Japanese women. I wouldn’t go so far as to say they see women as a lesser class of people, but they definitely have a more subservient role in the Japanese culture. To this end, women tended to dress extremely feminine and the norm was some type of skirt (usually very short), leggings or nylons, some kind of fashion boot with high heels, and a dressy blouse / jacket combo. This was not an unusual in Japan…

Men were also more fashionable than here in the U.S. and we would tend to say they had the “metro” look, but somehow the Japanese men tend to pull it off without looking gay. In fact, I didn’t see hardly any flaming gay Japanese guys until we got to Kyoto.

One thing that men tended to wear more than women were shoes that were excessively long. Apparently there either was, or is, an Italian fashion trend to extend the length of the shoe slightly. In Japan, they took it to the next level and the shoe, or boot, might be at least a third again as long as it needed to be. This gave people’s feet a very awkward appearance and I was reminded of the images you see of court jester’s. We asked our friend Daisuke about it and he said he thought it looked pretty stupid.

On the flight over I teased my g/f when the female interpreter would come on and speak in a soothing Japanese voice – “Oh, that is really sexy” I’d tell her and she’d roll her eyes at me. When we got somewhere in Tokyo a good looking girl walked by us with an eye patch on her eye and I said “now that is really hot!” and of course my g/f said I was pretty much a sick bastard. Little did I know I was onto something and that is an actual Japanese fetish / sub-culture. Check this link out:
http://www.thethinkingblog.com/2007/08/latest-japanese-craze-bandage-fetish.html

I also saw a little old lady at one of the airports with an eye patch on, but I don’t think it had anything to do with the bandage fetish.

The other thing we noticed about the women that an extraordinarily large number of them were bowlegged, pigeon toed, knock kneed or some combination thereof. As it turns out this was another sub-culture fetish. The bowlegged chicks obviously had inherited this, but the huge amount of pigeon toed girls is apparently an affectation that is supposed to be appealing to Japanese men. Combine all that together and then throw a set of heels on them and you get a bunch of women that look like they have a lot of trouble walking with some kind of shuffling gate – we were reminded of the old practice of binding of the feet and wondered if this whole phenomenon was a throwback to this now illegal tradition.

And of course, you can’t forget the catholic inspired school girls uniforms that the Japanese chicks wear. Seems they were always either coming or going to school, 7-days a week and perhaps in shifts. I never quite figured it out. Here is a “stealth shot” at some of the kids as they were let out of school one afternoon….

And almost nobody wears sunglasses…..ever. We read somewhere that this is a holdover from the Yakuza. Some younger people would wear them, but you won’t see many people wearing sunglasses no matter how bright it is outside. No wonder they squint all the time!

Japan - Getting Around

2010-02-16T07:04:00.004-07:00

Bicycles were everywhere and like most large cities most people walked or took the subways. Japan has an extensive subway and rail system which makes getting around fairly easy if you are willing to try to read the signs and make some sense of them. Most of them had an English translation so it isn't that bad.

And while we never truly experienced being shoved onto a train by one of the Pushers we did have to pack onto a few trains during busy periods and I thought I was going to die. It was very hot and very stuffy. No moving air and sometimes I didn’t have room to get my jacket off. Needless to say I would be sweating my balls off by the time we got to one of our stops.

At one point, we were trying to get to the Narita airport and our train ticket said we had reserved seating on the N’EX (Narita Express), but every train that came through pretty much looked like the video above – they weren’t being pushed onto the train, but several people had trouble squeezing on and “sucking it in” so the doors would close. I told my g/f “Fuck that, I’m going back up (street side) to find a bar if it’s like that.” Fortunately, the N’EX was really nice and not crowded.

One thing that was a tad confusing is that there are two primary rail systems – the subway and the JR trains. To take a step further, we picked up JR rail passes but were only permitted to use them on certain trains. You end up switching between the JR trains and the subways quite a bit even though they may go to the same locations. BTW – if you go to Japan you need to get your JR Rail Pass certificate in the U.S. before you go. They will not issue one to you once you are in Japan. Once there, you have to exchange the certificate for the pass. It’s not hard but again, you have to get the certificate before you go or you are screwed.

But it really wasn’t that bad once you got used to it. The most difficult part of it was getting used to how crowded it was. Even at non-peak times some of the places were just outright packed. We saw a few exasperated European or Western travelers when we had to go through Tokyo station near rush-hour. We had been traveling for a week at this point so we were used to it, but you could tell the noobs were having trouble dealing with it.

Oh! And don’t forget the stairs. If you are handi-crippled or a fat bastard you are going to have problems navigating the subways and rail systems. It’s not that they don’t have any provisions for handi-crippleds, but there aren’t many. You would have to go way out of your way to find an elevator. Mostly it’s stairs. Up the stairs, down the stairs, up the stairs…etc. In some cases you would go down the stairs, do a u-turn, and go up another flight of stairs (not kidding). I saw this one guy in Tokyo station carrying his luggage and his snowboard bag and he was stuck in a throng of people hiking stairs behind a little old lady. He couldn’t get out from behind her and he was obviously tired of hiking stairs with all of his stuff. I wanted to slap him on the back as I was passing him and say “Welcome to Japan!”

We read that you should travel light in Japan, and that was good advice. Most of the trains (subway, JR, etc.) and other forms of transportation do not have much space for baggage. If you can keep it down to about two small bags you’ll be fine. One problem with this is that you will run out of clean clothes. I only found ONE public Laundromat the entire time I was there. Even the hotels don’t have them, but you can pay a fortune for laundry service if you want it. My advice? Take some laundry soap and do your stuff in the hotel sink, then let it dry on the rack / line for a couple of days.

Japan - Temples, Shrines, and Gardens

2010-02-16T06:54:00.009-07:00

We hit a few temples as well as a few shrines. I think the temples caught my eye more than the shrines did. We even took off our shoes and spent a few minutes in front of the alters. The places were very simple and elegant with the exception of the alters that were blinged out…. Bling! would have been proud. Sorry, no pics of the alters as we were not allowed to shoot in there. Keep in mind most of these places, like most of Japan, have burned down about 50 times with the last re-builds happening sometime in the last 200 years.

A bad ass dragon!

...and a little baby dragon

Check out this tree in front of one of the temples:

This temple was under construction and is covered by this awning:

I also have some shots of the Japanese garden which is a staple of any temple, shrine or palace. The gardens were very simple with only rock, trees, and waters. Large groups of blooming flowers is not part of the Japanese style.

Japan - An Assault on your Senses

2010-02-16T06:53:00.002-07:00

One thing about being in Japan is that you are going to be assaulted by sounds and people. There are a lot of people in a very small space and everything is going to make some kind of noise. We couldn’t even figure out why all the things were making noise but it started driving us nuts.

You will hear things chiming for no apparent reason. Elevators, doors, taxicabs, trains, busses, and even toilets would talk to you and then start beeping or chiming in some way.
You will smell fish and other things that you are not used to smelling. You will be visually assaulted by flashing lights, whirling thingies on traffic signs, and stuff moving around. And it’s all constant and non-stop.

And they have barkers, as in a carnival barker. People are constantly trying to get you to come into their store or place of business by standing by the door and yelling something…constantly. The worst was at the snow festival in Sapporo where we walked between two isles of food vendors. I swear, I think there were six people simultaneously yelling at us and I just wanted to scream and tell them we’d buy everything if they just shut up.

If you walk in, or out, of any place of business be prepared to have everyone in the store simultaneously greet you or wish you well on your way out – Gozaimasu!!. It’s kind of like going to CiCi’s Pizza on steroids.

We decreed when we got home that we would have a few days of absolute silence. It’s amazing how much we missed that

Japan - Odds and Ends

2010-02-16T06:28:00.017-07:00

One of the things we loved about Japan was the crazy signs. Sometimes we wanted to ask who they got to translate for them.

Yes, we tried some sweat. It wasn’t too bad. Kind of like a clear form of Gatorade.

Ever had “brend” coffee?

On the side of a water heater / kettle:

On the door of a public restroom – that had glass all around it and that you could see into!

Do you really want to shop here?

And our all-time favorite. This was in a menu at a noodle house:

And the Japanese have a huge sweet tooth. I’ve never been anywhere that I noticed so many chocolatiers, café’s and bakeries. And while they had some “low end” stuff like green tea, ginger, or even wasabi Kit-Kats most of the sweets were high-end gourmet type stuff.

This is a terrible photo, but it’s one of the chocolate shops in the Ginza district of Tokyo. Note the lighting, woodwork, and money that was put into this place and this was not unusual. Don’t go in there expecting to buy a $5 box of chocolates either. You might spend $5 on a piece of chocolate.

And these places were all over the place!! Department stores, airports, subways, you name it. All in all, I originally estimated an average of 1.5 chocolate shops per block in Tokyo. I now think that figure was too low.
I asked one guy why there were so many sweets and he said that the Japanese like to drink really strong green tea with the sweets so the tastes offset each other. I tried the tea and couldn’t drink it, but I don’t like tea. My g/f tried it and didn’t like it and she likes green tea. She said it tasted like “grass.” I thought she said it tasted like “ass” but as far I was concerned it was the same thing.

We also tried our hand at Pachinko, which is very big in Japan. It’s the equivalent of a Vegas slot machine and the places that have them are large and very noisy and crowded. We quickly found out that we sucked at it and decided we were better off trying out other things.

Other oddities…

Giant golden sperm:

Seriously, WTF?

Air fresheners?

And we never figured this one out even though it was quite popular:

A very frustrating Japanese keyboard…

And of course, Japanese money (not to scale):

What else…

The crows were huge and laughed at you with a “HA! HA!” type call instead of a “craw! Craw!” type call. I guess it’s the way they do it in Japan.

We only saw one begger in the entire two weeks we were there even though we saw plenty of poor or homeless people.

Cell phone charms were all the rage. People would be carrying $300 tiny little cell phones and have 5lbs of crap hanging off of them.

Japan - Would I go Back?

2010-02-16T06:28:00.016-07:00

Absolutely!! I loved Japan and would love to go back some day. I would do a few things differently, though.

For starters, I would take some cooler clothes so I wouldn’t be roasting whenever I was inside a building or on a train. I’d also spend more time in a ski area like Niseko and I would definitely spend a few more days in Kyoto. Tokyo? Not so much, though I’d want to visit with the people we met. And I’d try to spend just a little less time traveling once I got in the country.

I’d also like to see Japan in the spring as my friend’s photos all show it is quite beautiful with everything in bloom. I’ve heard to avoid it in the summer, though, as it can get quite warm and humid. I couldn’t imagine being stuck on a train with no air and my face pressed to the glass after sweating to death top-side.

It’s good to be back in the U.S.

Japan - Day 1

2010-01-27T05:53:00.002-07:00

Well, it's day 1 and we haven't left the airport yet. My g/f made it over at roughly 2:00am and by the time we finished packing and checking that we had everything it was right at 3:00am....that gave us about 1.5hrs to get some sleep before we had to get up.

No problems getting here, and we pretty much waltzed right through security. Now it's almost 7:00am and I am dead tired, but at least I am chilling in the Admiral's club. The chick at the counter asked if it was too early for bar coupons. "Um...no, it's not too early."

We have a flight to LA and then a slight layover before the long flight to Tokyo. I'll write more when I can, but I am not taking a laptop so I am not sure when I'll be back online. For most of you, this will seem quite normal (me not writing for a while).

Japanese Language Guide?

2010-01-26T15:17:00.001-07:00

I am heading to Japan tomorrow. I’ve got almost everything wrapped up. We found a great travel agent that deals extensively with travel in Japan. Though there has been a bit of a language barrier they’ve been very helpful.

They even sent this cool language / translation guide:

Thank god they sent it, after reading it I am sure I’ll have absolutely NO problem while I am there….

Imagine Me Naked....

2010-01-16T15:39:00.001-07:00

…going through airport security screening. Well, it isn’t going to happen. I know, I know…the government says that people polled indicated that they really don’t mind going through the naked scanners. Personally, I think that is a bunch of bull. Who did the survey? Besides, most of you…that’s right, you…are fucking sheep that will do whatever you are told to do.
Baaah….baaah…yes I’ll give up my rights
Baaaah…..baaaah…. search my bag and ask for my receipt it’s OK
….baaahh….baaahhh….let the government save me even if it’s unconstitutional….
Baaah…..baaah…. sure I’ll strip naked to get on airplane even if I don’t have to so much as pass thought a metal detector to ride a train or a bus.

What a crock of shit. And what really pissess me off is that it’s still the illusion of security. Think I am kidding? Think again! Many employees of the airport or third party companies like Sky Chefs don’t have to go through this crap.

Everyone is saying we need to do something!!! But we DID do something. We’ve made it harder and harder to get on airplanes. We have no-fly lists, and all kinds of stuff….but it was all ignored when homie got on the plane with his home made shoe bomb. The issue isn’t doing MORE, it’s simply following EXISTING policies!

People have asked me if I’d be willing to go through one of those things. Off the top of my head? Absolutely fucking not. I’ll take a pat down, and if they want to feel my junk then I’m just not going to fly.

Imagine what would happen if at even ONE airport everyone refused to go through this bullshit. You’d have cancelled and delayed flights. And it would quickly cripple the airline industry. They’d lighten up and be more sensible, but will it happen? No. Why? I already said it…your sheep! We’ve already shown that we like to be morons that can’t group together and fight for decent service from people.

Mandatory arbitration in contracts? Wouldn’t be a problem if we’d stop doing business with companies that demand it. Idiots that complain about Wal-Mart stopping them six and seven times to see their receipt? Hey fucktard! Go somewhere else!!

And this? Well, I’m quite sure I’ll be sitting next to someone on a flight bound for somewhere with them being pissed off because they had to go through one of those see-all scanners. Me? I’ll sit back, put on my iPod, smile to myself and try to adjust myself from the pat-down.

Japan Bitches!

2010-01-16T15:38:00.002-07:00

…at least that is how it looks in my outlook calendar right now. In just a couple of weeks I’ll be in Japan on a well deserved, and very long, vacation. I’m pretty excited about it and a little nervous. It’s not like going to Europe where our own culture is largely derived from European culture. No, this should be completely alien.

Fortunately, we have several contacts over there and at least one of us has made many trips. That means that I’ll be with some people for a few days that know how to get around and understand the culture a bit.

I plan on getting some snowboarding in near Tokyo and at Sapporo, but we aren’t making this a ski vacation. We want to check out some of the more local cultures, towns and temples.

Right now, we are still trying to lay out or itinerary and who we will be traveling with and where. There are some logistical issues traveling in Japan – like how much luggage you can carry as apparently the trains don’t have much room for it. I think I can get down to one small bad provided I can find some place to wash clothes. We haven’t even decided if we will take a laptop, but I’m sure one would be beneficial.

My x-g/f used to tell me that I never liked to go anywhere and do anything. I always found this confusing since I could recall many times I tried to get her to go out and do things with me, but she wouldn’t ever go. Most of the times, she would go off on her own or with her friends.

Since we split up, I’ve been to Canada, Costa Rica, Germany, France, Switzerland, Austria, Lichtenstein, and Jamaica. Inside the U.S. I’ve been all over the place as well…sometimes for work, and sometimes for vacation. So was it me, or was it the girl….

Mark McGwire is Also an Idiot!

2010-01-16T15:38:00.001-07:00

I read in the paper the other day that he is sorry. Really really sorry that he used steroids. He was crying on the phone to the McPaper (USA Today) reporter….boo-fucking-hoo.

Give me a break. He’s not sorry he used steroids. He used them for YEARS and he became very successful because of them. He made MILLIONS of dollars because of them. He set world records and got endorsements and fans loved him.

He’s not sorry because of that. He’s sorry he got caught…..