Blog Number 82

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Let me apologize in advance for today's random thought.  I don't know why I think of these things but I do.  Just be thankful you are not me, plagued with these random thoughts that I have to get out.

So I am watching Clifford, the Big Red Dog the other day with my daughter and this thought occurs to me.  Where is the Big Red Pooper Scooper?  I mean, think about it.  This dog is about the size of a house, the dung piles have got to be enormous.  I cannot enjoy the show since I am pondering this concept.  Perhaps the father sells the manure as fertilizer to the local gardeners.  This is probably not the case given that they live on an island and the laws of supply and demand would come into play making the manure to be almost worthless.  If the father does not sell it, what else is he going to do with it?  If you wanted some manure, you could almost get it for free.

The apartment complex that I live in allows pets.  There are even little baggy dispensers located around the property for you to use to clean up after your pet.  According to the Wikipedia Pooper Scooper article, Germany actually does DNA testing on pet fecal matter left on public property and fines the dog owner for any waste that was left behind.

Anyway, the more I think about it, the more I would not want to be around Clifford.  Plus, since my kids are just like me, it is not long until they ponder the pooper scooper mystery as well.  It is a good thing I have taken the time to think it all the way through so I that I will have an answer for them when the time comes.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 81

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

First, a small update.  Faithful readers, the fennel toothpaste is almost gone.  Hopefully when the wife buys a new tube, I will get lucky with the new flavor.

While driving to work today, I was listening to NPR (National Public Radio).  "Jon," you say, "you are a hip dude.  Surely you don't listen to 'talk' radio?"  Well, you are wrong.  It comes in at 90.1 on my FM dial and my favorite station is at 89.7.  So whenever it is not playing music, I switch up 2 turns of the tuning knob to the NPR station.

OK, now that that is settled, on to the random thought  As I was listening to NPR, they mentioned an interesting story out of China.  It seems that the local authorities were cutting the number of teachers in the schools.  All teachers EXCEPT WIDOWS and DIVORCEES with children, would be fired.  Amazingly, many teachers filed for divorce in order to keep their jobs!  Insane!

Or is it?  This story reminded me of the health insurance at my workplace.  "OK Jon, even with your twisted mind, how do you draw a line between the two?"  Easy, you see, you are only allowed to change your health insurance choices one time a year (during October, so this is fresh on my mind).  The only other time you are allowed to change your insurance is if there is a "qualifying" event in your family.  Qualifying events include births, deaths, marriage and (you guessed it) divorces.  I discovered all of this information a few years ago (I think in the month of May) when trying to figure out how to change health care providers.  Given that we were not going to have any more children and that I was already married, that left only death and divorce as my only means for qualifying to change my insurance.  I immediately ruled out death of course leaving me with my only option.  The only way to change my health insurance was to get a divorce.

Now this is absurd and the wife and I had a small laugh over the matter but I can appreciate (just a little) what these poor Chinese school teachers are going through.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 80

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Once you head down the 19 stairs to the bottom floor of our apartment building, then head down the sidewalk, you eventually end up at the curb.  It is at this curb that every time (without fail) my daughter has to practice her "steady."  This is what she calls it when she hops onto the curb and pretends it is a balance beam.  She puts her arms out for balance and slowly makes the walk.  The curb actually takes a few 90 degree turns so there is some degree of difficulty involved here.  I should know, I practice my "steady" too whenever I am with her.  The son usually joins in as well.  He is a little more competitive at this than the daughter who is simply happy to just walk on the curb.  If he gets a little braggy about his ability, I usually give him a little shove, just enough to cause him to lose his balance.  I have yet to see the wife join in.  I don't know how she expects to get any better without practicing!

We will practice our "steady" on any thin, raised concrete surface.  This would involve any other curbs we encounter while out and about, and also speed bumps (while not exactly thin, they are rounded and provide a different type of challenge).  If I am not careful, I will do this even when alone (like for instance when walking to my car in my office parking lot).  I have to catch myself as this looks slightly unprofessional (OK, it actually looks like I need some mental help).

So anyway, if you see a grown man balancing himself on a curb, give him the benefit of the doubt would ya?  You can't get any better unless you practice.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 79

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Back in the building that I worked at in Indiana, every Friday was jean day.  You were allowed to wear jeans as long as they were in good taste (no holes, etc.).  Every once in a while there would be a fund raiser where you could pay $1 and wear jeans on a non-Friday.  I usually did not wear jeans on Friday (and never paid the $1 to do so on non-Fridays).  The building was not that big so I cannot imagine that these non-Friday jean days raised very much money.

Recently in the building I work at here in Texas, they announced a fund raiser where (for $5) you can wear jeans (talk about your cost of living increase!).  A lady in a cube near me has a flag mounted atop her cube proclaiming that she is the jean coordinator.  I think you can actually pay $25 and wear jeans for an entire week.

Now I will try to be kind here, but there are some people that simply should not be allowed to wear jeans.  These people just don't have "jean" bodies.  I do not wish to offend, it is simply a matter of genes.  I think you should be able to have a fund raiser where you could pay money and be allowed to have another person NOT wear jeans.  If they pay $5 to be able to wear jeans, then you could pay $10 and remove their jean wearing ability for that day.  It could all be anonymous and no one else would need to know.  If you have paid your $5 you simply check in with the jean coordinator right before close of business the day before jean day and see if your $5 held up.  Pretty sick what I think about, huh?

This type of system though is probably the only way to get me to donate to jean day.  I would also like to take this time to announce my new fund raiser.  For $10 you can request that I NOT blog on a certain day.  Send in those donations!

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 78

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Flipping through the channels tonight I came across televangelist Richard Roberts (son of Oral Roberts).  I had the TV on mute so I am not sure what he was saying but I did notice that across the bottom of the screen was their ministry's website - orm.cc.  I had never heard of a website ending in .cc so I had to ask Mr. Google to see what info he had for me.  Turns out that the .cc domain belongs to the Cocos Islands.  I had heard of a few countries that were selling domain names with their country extensions (the United States has .us, Canada has .ca, France has .fr, etc - complete list is here) but the only one I had heard of that was actually making a profit was the .tv domain (belonging to the country of Tuvalu) for obvious reasons.  That country just plain got lucky when it came to 2 letter domain assignments.

Anyway, some dude in Seattle originally procured the rights to sell domain names ending in .cc.  I looked and indeed orm.com is taken (by something called Pope Resources).  So if you are Oral Roberts Ministries, what are you gonna do?  If you want to see if your domain name is taken, you can go to the .cc domain site and do a search.

Another way that I know of to get close to your domain is to typo-squat.  Typo-squatting is where you register a domain that is a typo of a more popular site (like microsfot.com or micorsoft.com or micrdsoft.com for instance).  Of course I am the only person I know that finds this fascinating.  Microsoft has a site set up to track this kind of thing actually.

Isn't this fascinating? Aren't you glad you read my blog today?  By the way, someone registered xanga.cc already.  But according to the small print on the right side of the xanga.cc home page, it is for sale for the bargain price of $9,999.00.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 77

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So I am blogging right now in order to get out of watching Six Days, Seven Nights with my wife and mother (who is in town for a few days visit).  My mom invited my cousin over for lunch today along with my cousin's boyfriend.  Also invited was my mother's cousin so all in all there were 8 of us.  We all enjoyed the baked spaghetti my wife made although the chocolate brownies were not quite the success she had hoped for (of course I write this blog having just polished off 2 more of them).  The highlight of the afternoon was the chess match between my 8 year old son and my cousin's boyfriend.  The look on this guys face as he went from opening to being slightly behind to being really behind to the point where he knocked over his king in defeat was priceless.  The ego is a touch thing to have bruised.  He took it well though.  I have a feeling that I have had that look on my face as well many times when trying to beat my own son at chess.

Tonight was week 3 out of 4 in a class we are attending at church involving marriage enrichment.  The phrase "marriage enrichment" is pretty much repellent to guys.  The class has about 12-15 people in it give or take.  Tonight we did an exercise where we sat "eye to eye, knee to knee, & heart to heart" with our significant other.  I will admit that when I saw that this was an exercise that we had to do, I (along with every man in the class) shuffled nervously in our seats (trying to remember exactly how in the world we let our wives talk us into this class).  So we sat facing each other and were given phrases to start a one minute, on sided conversation where the other person could not talk but could only listen (guys, I can hear you squirming at the mere thought of this).  We each did this twice.  It is amazing how long a minute is when doing this kind of exercise.

Well, long story short, I survived the night.  All in all it was not as bad as I made it out to be.  I even learned a few things.  And it was better than getting beat by an 8 year old at chess.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 76

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well today was supposed to be the son's first soccer game.  I will admit freely that I really have no desire to watch 8 year olds play soccer.  I don't even have a desire to see professional soccer players play soccer but he seemed excited so I tried to be (OK, faithful reader, I know you are saying to yourself, "You are willing to sit through an all day chess tournament, wouldn't this be both shorter and more exciting?"  You are probably right).  The son is really into weather right now (a topic for another blog) and he was concerned that his game might be cancelled because of rain.  The soccer league he is in is run by our church so that is where the soccer field is.  It was not raining that much when we headed off to the soccer field but by the time we got there it was obvious that no game was going to be played today.  The game was supposed to start at 10:30 and the rain lasted about an hour.  By noon, the sun had come out and it was a gorgeous day (although it was a little windy).

Tonight there was an air show (also at our church).  Evidently there is an airstrip nearby and one of the guys there has a biplane and he does the standard tricks.  He offered to do a show so about 200 or so of us showed up to be impressed.  There were also 2 large bounce houses set up for the kids.  By the time the show started at 7:30, it was about 75 degrees (perfect weather for an airshow really).  The pilot's tricks lasted about 15 minutes and were very impressive.  All this was lost on the kids though since the bounce houses won in the contest for their attention.  They stayed in there bouncing around until the workers were ready to take them down.

So the day started in disappointment at the church for all of us and ended with excitement there for all of us.  We will head back there tomorrow of course for regular Sunday morning service.  I have a feeling though that the kids will want to have the bounce houses blown back up for Sunday school.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 75

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

A few weeks ago, I mentioned that my son was recording how many minutes he read each day.  He has a log where he records this and keeps a running total for the 6 weeks session.  Well the session is over and even though he logged over 500 minutes which I thought was impressive for an 8 year old, he has committed himself to do over 600 for the next 6 week session.

His higher goal is due in part to the fact that he did not finish near the top in his class for total minutes read.  There were a few students that claimed to have read over 1,000 minutes.  This is roughly 25 minutes per day (40 minutes per day for the kid who actually won).  I don't know if I believe this or not but my son is committed to reading more each day and I am all for that.

I was telling him tonight about a similar contest that we had while I was in 5th grade.  We did not record our minutes but rather how many books we had read.  The competition lasted all year and the winners were to receive prizes.  You could check out books from the school library and your parent had to write a note stating that you had read a book.  I remember my mother dutifully writing notes as I completed each book.  I even complained that her notes were too plain (Dear Teacher, Jon read this book, signed - Jon's Mom).  I had read a book about the mail system and she then wrote a longer note detailing that I enjoyed the book since my dad worked for the post office.

Anyway, the year came to a close and I was a few books ahead of the nearest boy.  I think I had read something like 80 books.  There were a few girls in the 100's but I had no interest in beating them.  The day finally came when they were passing out the awards and when the called my name I went to the front of the class.  I was then handed my prize.

It was a stupid book!  I could not believe it!  The one thing I did NOT want to see was another book!  I remember thinking how much the teachers did not understand kids.  It was like having a broccoli eating contest with the winner getting more broccoli.  Believe it or not, when I asked my son what the leaders win for his contest, he said it was also a book.  Insane!

I never read the book I won by the way.  I kept it for about 15 years but only because my teacher signed the inside of it and I really liked that teacher.  But there was no way I was ever going to read that book, out of sheer principle.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 74

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Today I had lunch at the cafeteria in my building.  This is no ordinary cafeteria.  They have a place that makes burgers (5 different kinds including sirloin and veggie), a place that makes tacos and burritos, a place that makes fresh deli sandwiches to order, a place where you make your own salad, a place that makes pasta and pizza to order, and plenty of other choices like fresh fruit, bagels, etc.  I think they even have sushi some days and I hear that on Tuesdays and Thursdays the fajita soup is to die for.  Anyway, I ate lunch there today.

At the pizza / pasta place you have your choice of veggie or meat.  The meat version typically costs more.  Having meat on your pasta is an extra $1 and having meat on your pizza is an extra $0.50.  Once you have your pizza run through the mini oven for five minutes, it is placed in a cardboard box and you take it to one of several checkout lines.  Up until today, every time I have chosen pizza, I simply told them I had the veggie pizza and I was charged the lower price.  Today however, I was asked to open my box to prove that I was truly getting only veggies.  This really did not bother me.  This is quite understandable.  People are people and whether you make $20K / year or $200K / year, you might be tempted to lie about your toppings and save the 50 cents.

The guy 2 spots behind me in line seemed to take offense at this on my behalf and made a few comments toward the cashier.  I smiled and paid for my pizza (after showing that I only had tomato, onion, peppers and pineapple - OK pineapple is not a veggie, but there is no posted charge for fruit pizza).

I have had the afternoon to think about this.  I wonder if I look like the sort of character that would steal 50 cents worth of meat toppings?  Was there sweat on my upper lip that made me appear like a thief?  Maybe I was just an unlucky person in part of a random pizza check policy that up until today I had just happened to avoid.  I may never know the answer I guess.  If I were the cashier though, I would have charged the guy 2 spots behind me an extra $1 for his comments to make of for the meat topping stealers out there.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 73

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Back in July I spoke how chess applied to breakfast (at least for my family).  Well it (kinda) happened again.

A few weeks ago, my wife experienced "zugzwang."  In chess, this is where a player is at a disadvantage no matter what move they make.  It would be better if the player could skip their move (were that a legal move).  As you know, we are in Texas now.  In order to get our license plates, we had to get our cars inspected.  This costs about $40.  The cost is the same whether you pass the inspection or not.  There are plenty of certified shops that will perform this inspection for you.

The wife took the Buick in and was told that the car failed on one item.  Whatever the problem was, it was being caused by a bad gas cap.  Now a gas cap is < $10 at any parts store however the inspection place wanted to charge her $20.  Here is where the zugzwang comes in.  She could either pay the $20 (for the $10 gas cap) or drive the Buick to the nearest parts store, buy a $10 gas cap, then have the car re-inspected.  By driving the car out of the shop though, this would cause us to pay another $40 once we brought back the car with the new ($10) gas cap.

Well, the lesser of two evils was to pay the $20 for the gas cap and that is what she did.  This is just one more cost to add up to my "free" Buick.  And just one more time that chess has intervened in our lives.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 72

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Tonight as the wife is reading a book, I am watching back to back episodes of the 2006 World Series of Poker on ESPN.  I just can't stop watching it!  I don't know why.  I don't play poker, I have never played poker.  I am not much of a gambler really although I did occasionally gamble on my bowling skills.

I don't think I am the target audience of this show though.  I only say this because I am not at all interested in any of the products advertised on the commercials.  There are ads for the typical poker websites (all with fine print saying that they are NOT gambling sites, somehow I don't believe this).  There are ads for beer (Milwaukee's Best).  These ads (like most beer ads) are pretty entertaining.  I don't know very many beer drinkers, but of the ones I do know, none of them choose the brand based on the funniest commercials.  There is an ad for a video game version of the World Series of Poker (available for XBox, PlayStation, GameCube and PC).  This could be the subject of a whole other blog really, people who actually buy a poker game for their XBox.

All of those commercials don't bother me (other than the fact that they interrupt the show).  But there is one commercial that has actually turned me off of a brand name.  There is a commercial for Kentucky Fried Chicken.  They have this sandwich called the KFC Snacker and evidently it is only $1.  The commercial is specifically for the Ultimate Cheese KFC Snacker which appears to be the normal snacker with cheese on it.  So this commercial is really just to tell you that they took a sandwich that they already made, and (gasp) added cheese to it.  I am not sure how you could apply the title "Ultimate" here since it is just normal cheese.  I remember that Hardee's used to have a sandwich called the Ultimate Bacon Cheeseburger.  Now THAT was a sandwich!  It was on a hoagie style bun and had 3 different kinds of cheese on it and 6 strips of bacon.  It was hard even to finish one.  This wimpy chicken sandwich pales in comparison.

Also, the premise of the commercial is asinine.  There are several cars in line to pay a toll on a toll road.  The front car has no change since the person's last dollar was spent on this "ultimate" sandwich.  Now instead of moving to a line where you could pay by other means, they simply yell to the cars behind them that they have no change due to the purchase of this sandwich.  The 2 cars behind them are not mad but are now interested in more information about the sandwich.  Then a semi driver a few more cars back uses his CB to notify his fellow truckers of this sandwich.

Anyway, I am not going to KFC anymore.  This commercial should have never been made.  The same guys that made this commercial were probably the same guys that thought adding cheese to an existing product made it "ultimate."

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 71

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

I am fortunate to work for a company that provides free coffee.  Not only that, but they have the industrial size coffee brewing machines that offers 2 separate brewing stations and 4 other burners to keep other pots of coffee warm.  The coffee room closest to my cubicle has all this but only boasts 3 coffee pots (2 regular and 1 decaf).  Back in Indiana, the office there only had 1 brewer and 2 extra burners but it also had the 3 coffee pots.

I am not sure that the superior coffee station does me any good since it is limited by the 3 coffee pots making all the extra burners irrelevant.  When I came in this morning, all 3 pots were full with blue-ish water.  This was a little scary initially as the only place I have ever seen water this color is in the toilets in airplanes.  Once that momentary thought left my mind, I realized that there must be some kind of cleaner in them.  Upon further inspection I discovered a 12 oz bottle of Squeak "N" Clean coffee pot cleaner in the corner.  I never knew something like this existed.
Anyway, my point (if I had one) was that if I wanted coffee, I was going to have to make some.  This was the way it was in Kokomo to a certain extent.  I had a very high ratio of "pots of coffee made" to "cups of coffee drank".  Ideally, in a perfect office society, if a pot of coffee provided 6 cups of coffee, you should have a 1:6 ratio.  I would estimate my ratio in Kokomo was maybe 1:3 or 1:3.5 (give or take, I don't have my spreadsheet handy where I used to keep track, hey someone has to keep track of these things!).  I envision the folks in Kokomo missing me (or at least missing that long haired dude that made the coffee).  I have only been in Texas for about 6 weeks and my ratio is about 1:5 so at least it is an improvement.

I read the directions on the cleaner and it simply stated that you had to rinse out the pot with water after using the product and you were good to go.  I did that and started a pot and then went back to my cube.  About 10 minutes later I went to get some coffee.  The other 2 pots were still there with blue water in them and my pot was about 1/2 gone.  I cleaned out another pot and started to brew a 2nd pot of coffee.  I also checked the hallways for dead bodies (just in case I didn't get the pot cleaned out properly on the 1st pot and that blue stuff was indeed toxic).  I did not see anyone suffering any ill effects so I poured a cup for myself.  Later in the morning I went for a 2nd pot and both pots were pretty empty so I combined them and made another pot.  This puts todays ratio at 3:2 today which really brings the average up given my short time here.

Hopefully this was just an off day for the Texas office coffee drinkers.  Otherwise I might have to test the toxicity of the blue stuff with a few random pots (just kidding of course, but hey someone has to keep track of these things).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 70

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Last week we went in search of a Panera Bread.  In Kokomo, it was almost a weekly routine to go there for breakfast on the way to church.  Everyone in the family loves their bagels so we thought going to one here in Texas might make us miss home a little less.  Now when I say we went in search, what I mean is that we asked Mr. Google and he told us that there was one about 10 minutes north of us.  We weren't just aimlessly driving around hoping to stumble upon one.

In the strip mall next to the Panera was a Half Priced Books.  Despite their name, they sell more than books.  They have used VHS, DVD, CDs and even LPs.  One of my favorite things to do is flip through used CDs so I jumped right in.  Unfortunately the wanted about $9 for a used CD which I think is insane (especially with eBay out there and all the online music stores).  Initially I was disappointed since part of the fun of flipping through the piles is the hope that you might find something you want for a decent price.  I wandered around the store a little longer and then discovered that below the LPs were other stacks of CDs and they were marked DISCOUNT.  I jumped in but did not have the time to devote to it since the family was ready to head home.  I made a mental note to get back soon.  Today I was able to get back.

I would estimate that there were 2,000 CDs there and all were marked either $3 or $1.  Since I am a seasoned pro, it only took me about an hour to flip through them all (that is about a CD every 2 seconds).  I ended up selecting 11 CDs but after inspection, 2 of them appeared to have too many surface scratches so I put them back.  Of the remaining 9 that passed the grade, 5 of the CDs were $3 each and the other 4 were only $1.  I ended up with the following...

• $3 EACH
• Matchbox Twenty, "More Than You Think You Are"
• Matchbox Twenty, "Mad Season"
• Matt Redman, "The Friendship and the Fear"
• Deep Forest, "Deep Forest"
• Deep Forest, "Comparsa"
• $1 EACH
• Steve Bell, "Each Rare Moment" (live in concert)
• Hokus Pick, "Brothers From Different Mothers"
• Scott Blackwell, "Walk on the Wild Side" (out of print)
• Alice Cooper, "Hey Stoopid" (hey, it was only a buck and I actually like the first song)

Now we each have our own taste in music and I am fortunate to like things that others would, oh I don't know, think less enough of to put in the bargain pile.  There seemed to be no end in the pile to stuff that I had never heard of but there were lots of CDs that I did recognize but could not justify even $3 (or at times $1) to purchase.  There had to be at least 4 copies of "Cosmic Thing" by the B-52's along with many copies of every older Mariah Carey album.

One thing I did see though disappointed me.  It was Volume III of Charlie Peacock's "West Coast Diaries."  Charlie Peacock is my all time favorite artist.  Most of you reading this will never had heard of him.  His only claim to fame is co-writing "Every Heartbeat" off of Amy Grant's 1991 multi platinum "Heart In Motion" album.  That song went to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.  Anyway, I got to see Charlie in concert back during that time frame and his music and lyrics have always spoken to me on a personal level.  I have just about everything he has ever released.  So to see that not only had someone brought in that CD to trade in but that someone else at the store did not consider it worthy enough to escape the bargain bin, well, that really bothered me for some reason.  I almost bought it just so it would not have to be there any more (even though I have this on both CD and cassette already).

Anyway, I think I got some pretty good music for my $20.57 (tax included).  Faithful reader I do ask 2 things of you this day.  Please don't make fun of me for buying "Hey Stoopid" or point out the irony in spending $1 for an album with that title and please, please if you ever see a Charlie Peacock CD in the bargain bin, rescue it, for my sake.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 69

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So today the whole family went to watch my son at his Texas chess debut.  There was a tournament in Richardson that drew about 50 kids.  He has played in over 30 tournaments in Indiana and there are a few differences that we noticed right off the bat.  Firstly, there were no concessions.  Generally the chess club that hosts the tournament does so in order to raise money for their club and running concessions is a great way to raise funds.  There was a break for lunch between round 2 and 3 and you were on your own to go get some food.  Secondly, the kids were not separated by age / grade.  In Indiana, there are divisions in each tournament (usually 3rd grade and under, 6th and under, etc.).  You play only kids your own age.  In this tournament, there were no divisions and you played everyone regardless of age.  Thirdly, there was no "skittles" area.  This is an area you can go between rounds and relax or go over your last game.  This tournament was held in a recreation center and the actual competition was in the gymnasium.  Immediately outside the gym was a multipurpose room.  When we first arrived, there was an exercise class going on (complete with obscenely loud, thumping music).  Later in the day, they brought out table tennis (ping-pong) tables.

There were some serious table tennis players there.  It was like watching the Olympics.  Most of the better players were oriental but there were a few grandma looking aged women that had some serious game.  I would not want to be on the other end of their forehand smashes!  For the most part the people playing just looked annoyed that these chess people had invaded their territory for the day.

The son did pretty good.  He won 4 out of his 5 games and his only loss came to a player rated over 200 points higher than him.  He was even slightly ahead for the middle game (up an exchange - knight for rook) but was checkmated by a sneaky queen sacrifice by the other player.  His last game was also against a higher rated player (about 140 points higher).  This is the highest rated player he has ever defeated so the day ended on a good note.  He was the 14th highest rated player there and he finished in 4th place overall so we are very proud of his play today.

Just a slight word before I sign off about chess parents (plus, Dumb and Dumber is starting soon).  They are truly unique.  I don't blame them though really.  For all you sports parents out there, imagine a sport where there is no cheering whatsoever!  You can't celebrate a good opening combination by yelling, "Good Queen's Gambit!  Way to sacrifice that pawn buddy!"  You can't start a cheer, "Give me a C, an A, an S-T-L-E, what's that spell?"  And you can't start chanting, "Check-Mate, Check-Mate!"

Being a chess parent is hard.  But so is watching a 50 year old woman play ping-pong so well that you know she would wipe the floor with you.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 68

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Kudos to the wife who reminded me as I was heading to the bedroom that I had not blogged tonight.  Read on to see if she should have just let me go to sleep.

Like most families, ours has a nightly routine.  Typically it is dinner, then bath / shower time (for the kids), then we do family devotions and then the kids are off to bed.  There is usually time for a game of chess in there or maybe a walk.  Sometimes we do popcorn or ice cream after bath time just to mix it up a little.  Right after the kids are in bed, the wife lays down on the couch and falls asleep and sometime later I wander over to the PC and blog.

Now, you are probably saying to yourself, "Jon, stop it!  Your exciting life is making me feel bad about my really boring one!"  Well, I am sorry.  I cannot lie, my life is just THAT exciting.

One thing that usually changes each night is who will give our daughter a bath.  She will be 5 in December and has not quite graduated to the shower like our son has.  Sometimes giving her a bath will be used as a bargaining chip, "I will take the garbage out if you will do the bath tonight."

Either way, a bath MUST be given.  The daughter keeps track of who's turn it is.  If someone gets two "turns" In a row, she is there to point out this unfairness.  You see to her, giving her a bath is a privilege.  She says, "It's your turn, Daddy." like it is a special treat or something.  As if we should be happy that it is our turn.  And she is serious too, and points out how unfair it is to my wife should she happen to do bath duty two nights in a row.  I don't know where she gets this idea from really.

Now the wife is all business when it comes to bathing while I (of course) tend to have more fun with it.  "Let's see if I can hit the ceiling with the water!" or "Let's see how many bubbles we can make with the body wash!"  It is no contest really who is the more entertaining bath giver.  Maybe I oversell how much fun I am having, who knows.  I don't miss giving my son a bath and really enjoy the fact that he is self sufficient in that area but I imagine I will actually miss giving someone a bath once the daughter graduates to the shower.

I think eventually though when she is all grown up, I will wish it was my "turn" again.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 67

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Tonight's thought is about men's restrooms or perhaps just restrooms in general.  I will admit (quite proudly) that I have spent precious little time in women's restrooms so I have no idea if this applies to all restrooms or not.

I have noticed that the toilet paper in the restroom closest to my cubicle always has a full roll of toilet paper.  I have been at work about 25 or so days and I do not think that I just happen to need to use the restroom right after the TP has been replenished.  I wonder what happens to the partial rolls?  Is there a market for half rolls of TP out there?  Some sort of black market perhaps?  I will say that it is really hard to get the TP out when the roll is so full.  It will hardly turn.  I usually start working on getting the necessary amount of TP right from the start.

A concern I have is what people think as I am leaving the restroom.  Do people wonder whether I washed my hands or not?  I do, I swear!  From time to time just as I am leaving the restroom (after washing my hands thoroughly) someone else will flush the toilet.  To the passer-by, it seems like I flushed the toilet and made a mad dash for the door.  I feel like I have to defend myself to whoever may be within view of the restroom door.

So anyway, if you see me leaving the restroom, no matter what sound you hear, rest assured that I washed my hands.  Also, if you see someone trying to sell a boatload of half empty TP rolls, let me know.  I will just carry it in with me so as to avoid using the full rolls already in there.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 66

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

As you faithful readers know, I am now living in an apartment.  Also, you know that I live on the 2nd floor (19 steps off the ground).  On the way up these steps I can see 2 of the 4 doors to the apartments on the first floor.  Each of these doors has a welcome mat in front of it.  As I go up the stairs I can see the doors to all 4 apartments on the 2nd floor (including mine of course).  All but mine have welcome mats as well.

This really started bugging me today.  I have no idea why.  The welcome mat is really just something to wipe your feet on and since it has seldom rained here, we really have no need.  Does not providing a welcome mat make me a bad neighbor or an unwelcoming host?  Does it make my apartment less inviting to passers-by?  So I walked up to the 3rd floor to see what they had in front of their doors.  Only 2 of the 4 had welcome mats.  So I walked downstairs to check out the 2 apartments that I could not see and they both have welcome mats.

So what have I learned today (other than there are a lot of places on the web to buy welcome mats)?  I think we can all agree that we have enough scientific evidence to prove that the higher the floor your apartment, the less "welcoming" you are.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 65

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So a few nights ago I slept on the couch all night.  "Jon," you say, "what did you do that was so wrong that your wife made you sleep on the couch?"  My, aren't we inquisitive today, hmm?  Well if you MUST know, I slept on the couch because I wanted to.  I love sleeping on the couch!  As my wife heads off to bed each night, she warns me NOT to fall asleep on the couch.  Oftentimes she will come into the living room in the wee hours of the morning and make me come to bed.

I have no idea why I enjoy this.  I enjoy napping on the couch as well.  There is just something comforting about it.  My daughter likes to sleep on the couch with me.  The word "couch" comes from the French word "coucher" which means "to sleep."  So I am actually using this piece of furniture for its intended purpose.

Perhaps I just like falling asleep watching TV and since the only TV I have had most of my married life has been in the same room as the couch, I associate that pleasure with the couch.  I did have a TV in the bedroom for a short time a few years ago, but seldom watched it in bed.  Maybe is a combination of the TV and the couch.  Who knows?

But when I am in trouble with the wife, she knows that she cannot punish me by making me sleep on the couch.  Ironically, her punishment is making me come to bed with her.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 64

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

My son had his first soccer practice tonight so the daughter and I had some quality time together.  Lately she just wants me to play with her ponies.  Her aunt and nanna got her this set of horses / ponies.  There are 2 horses and 4 ponies.  A few days ago she asked me their names so I made up 6 names on the spot: Charlie & Lady (the horses); Nicole, Patches, Milky and Rocker (the ponies).  I played for 15 minutes or so after naming them and now she has decided that they aren't fun to play with unless I am playing along as well.

Not wanting to play ponies, I offered to play Yahtzee Jr.  Our is the Toy Story version so you try to get a yahtzee with either (5) Buzz Lightyears, Mr. Potato Heads, Hamms, Jessie's, or Rex's.  The Woody's are wild so if you get one of them, it counts as anything.  Now with most kids games aimed at this age group, the game involves little if any skill and winning and losing is rather random.  Unless you are me, that is.  Tonight I was slaughtered by my 4 year old.  By the time of my final turn each game I would need like (7) of something in order to win (there are only 5 die).  Overall I think my win - loss record is something like 2 - 23.  How does she get so lucky!

This is how it was when my son was this age as well.  The game then was Chutes and Ladders.  No matter, this game involves no skill as well and I swear my record was like 3 - 80.  I don't know how he did it but he hit every ladder while I hit every chute!  All you have to do is spin a wheel and move your piece.  I majored in Mathematics in college and I know what kind of odds it takes for him to win such a large percentage of the games.  It is incredible!  At that age, he was the luckiest kid I knew.

I think that is why I like chess so much.  There is absolutely no luck in involved.  There is nothing random about it.  Of course my son is winning more and more games against me as he gets better / older.  The wife and I will play every once in a while and I usually win.  However, the few times she has won well, that was just luck.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 63

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So I was just reading a news story that said that gas prices have dropped $0.21 / gallon over the last 2 weeks and $0.37 / gallon over the last four weeks.  This is good news right?  Well no, not if you have my brain in your head (be thankful here faithful readers).

There are several reasons that lower gas prices do not make me happy.

1. SUV drivers: The gas guzzling people are suffering less.  Deep inside I think I have a disdain for these people.  I don't hate any of them on a personal level but I think my brain subscribes to the "It is not enough that I win, everyone else must lose" mentality.  This is actually my take on a quote by Gore Vidal, "It is not enough to succeed. Others must fail."  For some reason deep inside me, I get some kind of (sick) enjoyment that others are hurting more from high gas prices than I am.  I know, I am sick but at least I am honest.
2. My driving habits:  Since gas costs less, my safe driving habits save me less money.  This may just be a twist on the first one above but studies have shown that normal acceleration and braking can save you 50% in gas mileage.  Since gas is lower, my driving habits save me less money.
3. My Shell MasterCard:  I get 5% cash back from every $1 I spend on gas.  Now that gas is lower, I am "saving" less money.  This may be a twist on the second one above but what is the point of numbering a list if you only have one entry?

Anyway, this is the twisted way my mind works.  Others look at $2.40 / gallon prices and cheer or feel relief.  Me, I find a way to complain (and blog) about it.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

This Makes Bowling Look Exciting

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well today I screwed on our newly purchased Texas license plates.  For those of you still in Indiana, this is twice as much work as you are thinking.  In Texas, you have 2 plates per car.  One is for the front and one is for the back.  This was even more work since there were no holes in the front of our minivan.  We still don't have our driver's licenses yet but at least our cars are Texans now.

Since I have signed up for DirecTV, I have many more channels now then I did back in Kokomo with our cable provider there.  Mathematically this should give me more things to watch but I am here to tell you that it is not the case.  Now it does take me longer to flip through all the channels but I have spent most of my TV viewing time this week watching reruns of Who's Line Is It Anyway (both US and UK versions) and reruns on the Food Network.  Another thing that I could watch is poker.  It is on both ESPN channels as well as several other channels like The Travel Channel.  I have some friends who play poker and I will admit that I did try a few hands online the other night with play money (I "won" $150 in 3 minutes and then quit).

When I think of sports that I would not like to watch on TV, poker is toward the top of the list.   It is way behind the all time leader, fishing.  If others were to build a similar list I am sure bowling would be in their list.  Being a former professional bowler, I actually like to watch bowling.  One of the casualties of the move to Texas was my collection of VHS recordings of PBA telecasts.  I must have had 30, 6 hour tapes full of PBA shows from the 80's and 90's that I gave to a friend of mine.  He has really enjoyed re-watching the older telecasts.  Exciting stuff!  No really!

Anyway, I actually enjoy watching poker, but not playing it.  I think it all has to do with the production of the show and interaction of the play by play announcers.  The PBA has higher ratings recently and I know they have spent a lot on improving their image.

But trust me, there is no way you could make fishing exciting.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Happy 40th

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So today is the 40th anniversary of airing of the first episode of Star Trek.  Given that I am only 37, I have seen all the episodes as reruns.  In fact, right before I sat down to write this entry, I was watching The Trouble With Tribbles.

I remember when I went to see Star Trek: The Motion Picture at the movie theater.  I remember that they only fired one laser during the entire 2 hours and 12 minutes and I also remember falling asleep during the last hour or so of the film.  What a let down!

But all was forgiven when Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn came out.  Now this was a movie!  I have watched this movie about 50 times.  I remember one winter during the 80s when I watched it every week for about 30 weeks.  My mother was in a bowling league and so I would go over to my aunt's house.  My brother would go across the street to his friend's house.  My cousin would go to her room and listen to records and I would watch The Wrath of Kahn on Video Disc.  I have it on VHS (a far superior format to Video Disc) and love Ricardo Montalban as Kahn.  Try as they might, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise could not create a better bad guy (though the Borg were pretty convincing).

Much has been said about Star Wars being a superior franchise and HERE is a site describing the fire power of each relative technology (in case you don't go to the link, the Empire wins convincingly).  If that is the only measuring stick you use then yes, Star Wars wins.  But consider this, at the place where I work, you cannot go to www.starwars.com as it is blocked by the firewall.  You can get to www.startrek.com just fine however.

If your want to surf the web looking for sci-fi franchise information on company time, the winner is obvious (at least where I work).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Interpretation Please?

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So I wake up this morning right out of a strange dream.  Dreams are said to be either for exercising the synapses in the brain or to deal with immediate concerns in our lives.  There are several times in the Old Testament where dreams were interpreted and even prophetic.  So anyway, I try to at least think about my dreams before dismissing them, just in case.

Here was my dream.  I am looking into what I assume is my backyard and see a metal swing set.  On this swing set, a small dog (I assume it is mine) is swinging in a half shell of a coconut.  He is about 5 feet off the ground and I can tell that he cannot get down so I go to rescue him.  When I get there, I notice that the coconut shell is not hanging from a chain but very thick cobwebs and the cobweb is also connected to the top of a very tall telephone pole.  At the top of the pole where the cobweb ends is a very large bees nest, several nests actually.  My attempt to remove the dog from the coconut shell angers the bees and I can hear them humming loudly and heading toward me.  So I begin to run.  The bees appear to be about the size of mosquitoes and quickly catch me and land on my back.  I walk around to the front of the house (with the bee mosquitoes still on me).  If I walk fast, they start to get angry and hum.  If I walk slowly, the just stay on my back.  I awoke just as I was trying to decide how to get my shirt off.

Now I don't know about you but when I want answers I go to Mr. Google.  The first promising hit is this site that has an "interpret" feature where you put in what was in your dream and it tells you what it means.  Here are the results...

• Bees: To see bees in your dream, symbolizes good luck, harmony, and bliss. Bees are also symbolic of work and industry (so far, so good).
• Dog: To see a dog in your dream, indicates a skill that you have ignored or forgotten, but needs to be activated (again, not necessarily bad).
• Swing: To dream about a swing, represents an expression of great satisfaction and freedom (this is turning out better than I thought).
• Coconuts: To see a coconut in your dream, foretells that you will receive an unexpected gift of money (not sure if seeing an empty coconut shell would mean the opposite).

So, it is all good it seems.  Now I had a dream once when I was a teenager that I was a pregnant kangaroo in the express checkout lane at a grocery store where I was buying some Chicklets.  I wonder what that web site says that dream meant?

I think I will quit while I am ahead.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

It Goes Without Saying

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So we are now living in an apartment.  The apartment comes with many amenities: a community pool, a community workout room, a wrapping center (complete with paper, bows, gift bags, etc.), free movie rentals (selections change monthly), use of a pool table, use of 2 computers with high speed internet (during business hours) and to top it all off the community is behind some huge gates that you have to have a remote to in order to get in (which makes pizza delivery a little tricky).  I am sure I am forgetting some things but you get the idea, it is a pretty cool place to live.

I did notice though that on the front of the gate (the one you have to have a remote for) there is a sign that says, "No Solicitation."  Is this really necessary?  I would hope it is obvious to a would be solicitor that if you can't even get on the property, you might not be able to solicit.  Perhaps the sign is for tenants as they drive in to remind them not to solicit other occupants.  I know that I generally refuse to buy candy bars or other fund raising wares from anyone.  I do however offer to donate directly to the cause if they would only give me the correct person / business to make the check out to but they seldom follow up with that information.  I don't try to sell candy bars to my co-workers and I don't buy from them.  I figure this makes us even in the long run.

In general though I think the whole "No Solicitation" sign is not needed.  This should be a given rule.  I know of no one who wants to be solicited (ok, mind out of the gutter here readers).  This is also true of the "Do Not Call" list.  What a silly concept.  Does anyone like getting telemarketing calls?

I did get visited once by a foreign student trying to sell encyclopedias to help pay for his college.  I did have a No Solicitation sign on my front door but it was obvious that this was not one of the words in the English language that he understood.  I invited him in, gave him a glass of water and kindly explained what the sign meant so he could avoid the other houses in the neighborhood that also had signs like mine.  He was very thankful and understanding.

I think maybe I wouldn't mind being solicited by a No Solicitation sign salesman.  Now that would be niche market since by design there would be no repeat business.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Sign Here Please

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

One of the things I have learned at a father is never do something funny unless you are willing to do it a) 100 times in a row or b) every day for the foreseeable future.  I won't go into details but there are things that (for some reason) my kids find wildly entertaining.  Things that I wouldn't mind NOT doing for the rest of my life.  New fathers, this is my best advice to you: Don't do something for a simple laugh unless you want to do it many, many, many times in a row.

Anyway, my son has a reading goal for school.  He is supposed to read 200 minutes in the first 6 weeks.  This only averages out to about 5 minutes per day.  For the first week or so he was doing his best to stay at the minimum.  And then he picked up the pace since there were other kids at school that were up to 100 minutes ahead of him.  The wife has tried to get him to read over the last year or two and it was like pulling teeth.  But now all of a sudden it is a competition at school and reading has taken on a whole new purpose.  I don't know if this trick is going to work long term but I guess we will wait and see.

When he is done reading for the day, one of the parents has to sign a form that states what book was read, what day it was read on, how many minutes it was read, and what the total minutes to date for the six weeks is.  The wife signed the first week's worth and then one day she was gone and I was asked to sign.  Now the wife has excellent penmanship.  She really puts forth the effort for her signature to be pretty.  On the other hand, you are lucky to make out 2 letters of my last name.  My son watched me sign my name and he thought it was a joke.  He thought that no one would sign their name so poorly.  And my signature looks especially poor compared to the wife's a few lines up on the same sheet of paper.  So every night for the last week or so, he has requested that I be the one to sign this form.  He cracks up every time I scrawl out my "name."

There is another form that has to be initialed daily.  He requested (with a smirk on his face) that I also take care of this.  He was real disappointed when the J and D were actually legible.

I am predicting that form has only the wife's initials on it from now on.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

What Was I Thinking!?!

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So I wake up this morning and my first thought is not about having this day off of work.  It is not about sleeping in or maybe getting up to make the coffee (nudged the wife and talked her in to it).  It is not about getting up to go to the bathroom (though that made the top 5 thoughts for sure).  No, I was met with the haunting thought that I forgot to blog!  Oh, the horror!  I mean, I made it 50+ days in a row without missing (even when I did not have internet access at the apartment!).

Well I have had the day to think about it.  A day in which I spent time at the local mall (tons of blog-worthy material can be had at the mall).  I thought about the missed blog quite often and have come to the conclusion that I am just going to forgive myself for it and move on.  This is even a little bit liberating.  Perhaps at the end of the day if I do not have a truly blog-worthy random thought then (just perhaps) I will skip another day.  The pressure of this blog streak is over now and I have no desire to start over.

This may be a service to you as well faithful reader.  I mean which is better, logging on to this site and not finding a blog or finding one that is not entertaining?  I even thought of stopping altogether but an email I just received from a new reader made me banish that thought.  Evidently he discovered my blog during a marathon shopping trip with his wife and kids.  According to the email, my blog helped him set a personal record for time at a mall.

Maybe wherever that record is recorded, my blog will be mentioned in the fine print.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

A Long Forgotten Theory (I'll Make This Short)

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

When I was much younger I proposed a theory that tied the number of words spoken to the length of one's life.  I suggested that at birth, each person was assigned an exact number of words and when that number was reached, they died.  I think I spent about 10 minutes thinking this up and working through the various parts of the theory (why some people die much younger / older, what about people who are born mute, etc.).  All in all it seemed pretty solid.  Over the years I have explained this to the few people bored enough to listen to it.  Each attempted to poke holes in it, usually failing.

I then read a study suggesting that women use about 7,000 words per day and men about 2,000.  Again I had to adjust my theory accordingly.  So women are allotted approximately 3.5 times as much words at birth as men.  Talk show hosts are also obviously given a generous portion compared to the rest of us.

If people would actually believe my theory, I think the world would be a much better place.  Think of it, no idle chatter at all.  No wasted speech.  Why would you want to waste your words so carelessly as to discuss sports, soap operas, your kids or grandkids?  Speech would be so precious.  Think of the money saved in court cases alone.  No lawyer would want to make long winded speeches to the jury or judge.

The biggest hole in my theory originally was what about people who take vows of silence (like monks)?  I answer that by suggesting that somehow (through divine knowledge perhaps) they are told that they have very few (perhaps one) left and hence a vow of silence.

My proof?  Well may I suggest that the last words out of every monk's mouth who has taken such a vow is, "Ouch!"

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

One, Two, Zip Your Pants

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

One of the things that I got when moving down here was new work clothes.  I got 5 new pairs of pants and 6 new shirts.  This was a moving gift from my Mom (thanks Mom).  We went shopping one night back in Indiana.  I had not been clothes shopping with my mom in like 20+ years.  It seemed a little weird at first.  But hey, this was free clothes, so I got over it.

I decided not to wear any of the new clothes until we got down here to Texas.  Most of the pants were the same brand and style and all had both a button and a metal hook type connector.  It was here that my mind must have been confused.  My mother was with us the first few days in Texas since she helped us move down here (well, you do the math, we had the van, the Buick and a U-Haul and only the wife and I to drive them - believe it or not, it was cheaper to pay for her hotel room on the way down and a plane ticket back than it was to rent one of the pull behind devices to tow one of the vehicles).  Anyway, I was saying, Mom was with us for the first few days here in Texas.  Consequently, she was able to see my go to work in the clothes that she bought me.

The first morning she noticed that I had forgotten to zip my pants.  This has got to be a "Mother" thing since she noticed this right off the bat, right as I was leaving my bedroom and heading toward the kitchen.  Like she had this mental checklist to go over before I left the apartment, and "check fly" was toward the top of the list.  As I recall, I also left the pants unzipped the next day or two.

This really bothered me since I have been an adult for some time now and having my pants zipped before I leave the house is something that I thought I had mastered in my 37 years.  I chalked it up to being a result of getting dressed in a strange surrounding (the new apartment) and did not think about it again until earlier this week.  I think I have found a valid excuse.  You see I believe that mentally I was counting to two when putting on my pants.  1) Button Pants and 2) Zip Pants.  Since these new pants had both a button and a metal clasp (now steps 1 and 2), my mind stopped there and did not get to what was now step 3 (the zipping).  All my old pants just had the 2 steps and I just could not compute a 3rd step.

Are you buying this?  Didn't think so.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

1Jon