Blog Number 246

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well it is New Year's Eve.  A family from our ABF is coming over tonight.  It should be interesting as both of our families usually fall asleep around 10 PM on New Year's Eve.  We will have to see if we all make it.  We have the coffee pot thoroughly cleaned so we should be good to go.  Also, we found the 4 missing cards from our Uno deck (Can't you tell how exciting this party is going to be?  4 adults passed out at the card table at 10:15 after a rousing game of Uno?).

Christmas was very basic this year.  I mean we did not go anywhere or even wrap any gifts (some of the gifts shipped from Kokomo arrived wrapped but as a family we did not wrap any)...

Pretty boring, huh?  No matter, the kids had a great time "unboxing" their Christmas gifts.  The highlight was the Easy Button (from Staples) for the son.  It was the best $5 I spent all year long.  The look on his face when he found it in his stocking was great.  My favorite gift was the new CD by Tree63.  I already have several songs memorized and I have only owned it for a week.  Before the morning was over we had to reset our counter...

Notice that there are 366 days left (due to 2008 being a leap year).

Once again, I won the "who gave the best gift" contest that the wife and I have each year.  She received a Peyton Manning jersey and then subsequently bowed down before me to announce that I had won the contest for the 10th time in 11 years.  She will enjoy wearing this to our Superbowl party and to our church's annual Jersey Day service (where everyone wears their favorite team jersey).  She vowed to win next year (as she always does).  I have a slight advantage in that I am impossible to shop for but so be it.  The game is what it is.

I hope that each of you faithful readers have (had) a great Año Nuevo (New Year).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 245

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Sorry for the long delay between blogs.  It is not for a lack of things to blog about really, but a lack of free time to blog.  The whole family went to a Christmas party that was at my manager's manager's house.  Since I just switched managers, I did not know a lot of folks there but my wife wanted to go anyway.  The highlight was the gift exchange part of the evening.  Everyone who wanted to brought a gift and then we drew numbers to see who would go first.  When it was your turn, you could steal someone else's gift or pick out a new one.  If you had your gift stolen then you got to steal someone else's or choose a new one.  Once a particular gift was stolen twice it was "frozen" (meaning it could not be stolen again).  At any rate, we were number 22 out of 25 so I thought we were in a good position for a nice gift.  Once it was our turn, we stole a Pirates of the Caribbean 3 DVD.  The #23 person immediately stole this from us (freezing it).  We then opened a new gift (a few Starbucks gift cards were already frozen).  We got a nice book of Escher drawings which person #24 then stole from us.  People were laughing at my frustration.  In the end, we ended up with some snowman picture holders.

A couple of weeks ago we were at another party for people in our ABF (Sunday school class).  I decided to continue a tradition that was part of a Christmas party that we went to every year that we were in Kokomo.  Each year there were 3 jars of candy and each person could venture a guess as to how many pieces of candy were in each jar.  The person who was closest won the jar.  This was always a lot of fun and the winners were held in high regard.  Try as I might, each year I failed to come even remotely close on any jar.  I finally won after 5 years (last year) and I wanted to see if it would be as much fun being the person in charge.

Step 1 - Buy some candy

Step 2 - De-bag the candy

Step 3 - Get some jars

  __________

Step 4 - Fill the jars

 __________

The pictures are a little deceiving as the jar on the far right was the biggest.  Jar 1 ended up with about 180 pieces, jar 2 had about 50 and jar 3 had a little over 500.  I did a 4th jar that contained only gumballs (so the little kids could play) but did not get a picture of it.  It had about 75 gumballs in it (my daughter guessed 4,000 - hey think big!).  Anyway, it was not as big of a hit as I had hoped but I had fun filling the jars.  For the record, my wife was nowhere close on her guesses (though closer than the daughter).  I hope to do it again next year.  There was a gift exchange at this party and we did get the best gift (a t-shirt of the "I triple dog dare ya" scene from A Christmas Story) so the evening ended well.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 244

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

We are trucking right along in our Spanish lessons.  I now can say incredibly useful phrases like "La mujer está saltando" (The woman is jumping) and "Los niños están caminando" (The children are walking).  I say book the trip to Argentina now, I know all that I need to know!  The wife and son are taking the same lessons and I am trying to stay a lesson or two ahead of them so I can help them out if needed.  Also, I have the unfair advantage of talking to folks from Argentina on an almost daily basis so I can practice (and show off).

The dog (el perro) is growing like a weed.  She has about doubled her weight since the wife and kids brought her home.  She does have this annoying (to me) habit though of licking.  I suppose all dogs do this but I am not around all dogs.  Most of my time around the dog is planning ways to avoid getting licked (or splocked as I call it).  My wife has informed me of the various reasons why dogs lick but I am not buying any of it.  I have my own theory.  I think that her tongue just itches.  I mean, she will lick anything (and I mean anything, I will forego an exhaustive list of all things licked thus far but trust me, there are some humdingers in the list).  No, she cannot be licking for any of the reasons that my wife suggests   My "tongue itch" theory makes sense and covers the reason why she licks all the things that she does.  If there were a dog manual (that dogs are given when they leave their mothers and come to their new homes) I know there would be an entire chapter (perhaps several chapters) on licking.  It would be behind smelling in the list of importance but it is up there above chewing and biting.  Here is how I think the book would read (translated from the original dog language).

Chapter 2: Licking

From the moment you wake up until the time that you close your eyes for your next nap (see Chapter 7: Napping), your tongue will undoubtedly itch.  There is no use complaining (literally whining) about it but here are a few tips on controlling the ungodly itch.

• Lick things (all things).  For reasons beyond our dog comprehension, humans allow us this pleasure for our entire lives.  I have heard of a few owners who have caused a dog or two to stop licking but this is rare.  Odds are that you will be allowed to lick just about anything so abuse this privilege as much as you can.
• Lick certain things. 
  • Your crotch.  If you are alone you could literally lick this part of your body until you are out of saliva.  Be careful though as there have been a few cases of rashes breaking out down there.  Also, it is addictive and some dogs will find that they cannot be stopped even when disciplined by their owners.
  • Human flesh.  This is perhaps the best thing to lick of all.  There are certain chemicals in the human skin make up that alleviate the never ending itch.  If you have an adult male human in the house, lick his flesh every chance you get.  The adult male human flesh is the most potent antidote to the itch that is known to dogs.  Thank the bone gods if you have an adult male that will allow you to lick him.

Now this is just an excerpt of the dog manual as the chapter on licking is quite exhaustive (as those of you who have dogs can well imagine).  At any rate, I feel for our dog.  I know how I feel when I have an itch that I cannot scratch.  I will have to keep you posted on how she does.  Until then...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 243

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Somehow (and I don't know how), our dog has begun to join me on my morning walk.  I try to get up around 5 AM and have a route in the neighborhood that I travel around x amount of times (x, for those of you who forget algebra, is an unknown number).  The x depends on several factors but mostly revolves around the weather conditions (especially the wind as I am not a big fan of wind, I think it goes back to my younger days when I had much longer hair).  Anyway, someone (specifically the wife) suggested (this is a code word for "do it, there will be no discussion on this matter") that I take the dog each morning with me.  Gabbi (our dog) has inherited a feature from our cat in that around 4:45 it is imperative that at least one human should be awake and getting the the necessary chore of getting the animals some food.  The cat can be contained in another room and made to leave us alone for the most part but the dog (for now) is in a crate in our room at night so when she gets to whining, well someone has to get up.  So, I get up, get ready and grab the leash and now have a walking buddy.

I wanted to share with you an experience from Wednesday night too.  Wednesday evenings we drop the kids off at our church for the AWANA program and this leaves the wife and I for our only alone time for the week.  It lasts only about 1 hour (not including drive time) and we typically go to the Super Target and sit in the Starbucks that is located inside the store.  Anyway, we are sharing a venti Gingerbread Latte ($5 with tax!) and I am doing what any husband of 10+ years would do at that time.  I am half listening to the wife and half watching the shoppers as they meander by us.  I try to catch the key words of what the wife is saying since there is usually a pop quiz later and over the years I have done OK (probably a solid B average).  Anyway, at one point when I was not paying particular attention I did hear the phrase, "...there is now scientific evidence that milk thistle helps purify the liver..."  At this point in time I know that my quiz score will be low as I had no recollection of any conversation previous to this phrase that would indicate that how we got to a place where this phrase would fit into a normal conversation.  I froze and did the unthinkable.  I had to ask her to repeat herself (indicating that I was not paying attention).  I had to do this you see or else I would have lowered my pop quiz average something fierce.  It seems that milk thistle really does help (this ends the educational part of this blog, well it ends the blog too I guess).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 242

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Monday was my daughter's 6th birthday.  As I have mentioned before, our tradition is to have the birthday person pick a restaurant for their birthday dinner.  Once there, the birthday person gets the only menu and they get to order the entire meal for the family.  There are no rules however if you make a poor (or cruel) choice for someone you have to keep in mind that their birthday will come around eventually and payback will be allowed.  Anyway, the daughter picked Macaroni Grill (she has expensive tastes).  I had never been there before but the wife and daughter have and the birthday girl had her heart set on some fettuccini.  For those of you who have not been to this restaurant chain, they have butcher paper on the tables and give you ample crayons to draw and color while you wait for service / food.  I have to admit that I had too much fun with this and colored more than both kids put together.  When it came time to order our 6 year old did a great job.  She is typically quiet and the place was a little noisy so she had to speak up above her normal volume.  She ordered her fettuccini and a pizza for her brother (solidifying a good meal in July when he turns 10).  The menu had a thing called a Mama's Trio so she ordered that for the wife (logically since it said Mama right there on the menu!).  For me she ordered Chicken Cannelloni.  Everything was delicious (including the leftovers that I had for lunch yesterday).

One of the reasons that I invented this tradition is so that we are forced to try new dishes at restaurants.  Other than me, the rest of the family plays it fairly safe when eating out.  The kids stick with pizza, chicken or burgers.  The wife orders chicken 95% of the time.  I on the other hand am the adventurous one (though the wife will sample my food but that does not count as being adventurous since she has her dish as a backup in case she does not like it).  However on Monday, I was the only one that got to try anything new (the Mama's Trio was just chicken, chicken and lasagna).  The wife's birthday is in 10 days so we will do it all over again soon.  We started with her birthday last year (avoiding having a then 5 year old order for everyone since she could not read very big words then) so now we have completed the first year of this "tradition".  I put the word in quotes since I don't think you can consider it a tradition until you have done it twice.  Maybe next year at this time I can fully consider it a family tradition but for now, it is just something we have done for each family member.  I am guessing though that wherever we go for the wife's birthday dinner, she will order chicken.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 241

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

We are back in Texas again.  We cut our vacation short a few days.  Since we had most of the family at our house here in October, the trip back was not as needed as trips in the past.  Also, we were missing the Texas weather incredibly.

On the way up to Kokomo, we stayed at a Ramada Inn in Joplin, MO.  Joplin is about 1/3 of the way there (if you are coming from Texas) and (of course) 2/3 of the way home.  Splitting the 15 hour drive up into two days seemed like a great idea especially given the wildcard of having a puppy with us on the trip (the cat came too).  The only bad thing about travelling with the dog was that her "breaks" did not happen at the same schedule as ours.  Furthermore, she tended not to want to take care of business near heavy traffic (like say at a gas station).  As a result of this we made several other stops along the side of the road.  Our typical stop went something like this...

1. The dog indicates to my wife that a stop needs to be made (this is done via some sort of Vulcan mind meld as there were not many outward signs that I could see).
2. I find the next exit and then pull over to a grassy area.
3. The wife exits the car with the dog and they proceed to walk around a grassy area and do everything but what we stopped for originally.
4. The kids and I watch from the car and try to offer moral support.  This is done mostly but us chanting loudly, "Squat!  Squat!  Squat!"  Sometimes we even did a cheer, "Give me a S.  Give me a Q!" etc.
5. Sometime later, squattage occurs and we are back on our way.

The other problem with our 4 legged travelling companions is that the cat is not a big fan of the dog (this I know shocks you).  The cat spent most of the trip sitting on top of the luggage in the back of the van and looking out the back window.  From there, he was safe from the dog since she spent most the trip on the wife's lap or at her feet.  On the few occasions we had to leave them in the car together, madness ensued.  Though these stops were short (often only 10 minutes), the situation we returned to would take us hours to replicate.  The cat was invariably on the dash peering out toward us.  He was keeping watch for his rescuers it would seem.  The dog would be trapped somewhere in the middle or back of the van trapped or stuck or hung up in some way.  The cat would have a smug look of satisfaction of a job well done (but this is his usual look anyway so it is hard to tell if he was experiencing any satisfaction).  The van was pretty packed on the way up and even more so on the way home (as the kids got some Christmas presents while we were up there) so the predicaments that the dog found herself in were increasinbly complicated on the way home compared to the way there.  At any rate, we arrived home yesterday afternoon.  After unpacking, cleaning out the van and then getting a very late lunch, we headed to the grocery stores to restock the fridge / pantry.

We are all very thankful to be home and in a heat of frustration I made a promise that I was "never driving to Indiana again."  Time will tell if I fulfill my promise or not.  All I know is that we drove the car around last night and that is the only vehicle I am getting in for a while.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 240

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Let me start off by saying that Beaujolais Nouveau did not live up to all the hype.  I still  have 1 whole bottle left of the 2 I brought with me from Texas so I am ready to cut somebody a smoking deal on the remaining bottle.  The rest of the dinner went off pretty good though and a good time was had by all.  While we were out there, the kids got to open some Christmas presents (since they will not be up here for Christmas and the mother/sister-in-law wanted them to open them while everyone was there).  I even got to open up a present (a t-shirt and 4 bottles of wine - all from either Argentina or Chile).

We stayed in last night (our Texas bodies could not take going out in the cold I think) and watched a movie on TV.  We were pretty full from lunch so we did not need any dinner.  This morning though we headed out to a restaurant in the small nearby town of Greentown.  My mother actually works there on some mornings and we are related to or are friends with the rest of the staff there.  Since we have been in Texas we have been deprived of some good ol' biscuits-n-gravy.  The breakfast part of this place is run by different folks than the lunch/dinner group.  At night, this place is an authentic Italian restaurant (the owner is actually from Italy).  Even though the morning crew is a different bunch, the Italian part spills over a little.  For instance, the sausage they use for their sausage gravy is a spicy pizza sausage and not the normal breakfast sausage.  This gives it a little kick and it had a nice, peppery flavor as well.  I might have to find a way back there again before I leave.  We have also been craving their Gnocchi Amanda from when we had dinner there in July.

Well, the kids will be back here soon (they spent the night at their grandma's house) so I am going to go enjoy some alone time with the wife.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 239

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

We arrived safe and sound at my mother's house last evening around 5:30 local time.  The cat traveled well (he only meowed for a few miles) and the dog traveled extremely well (spending 90% of her time on my wife's lap) so I have nothing to complain about.  The hotel we stayed at in Joplin, MO, was doing some remodeling but the room we had was great (it even had a flat screen TV!).  The room next to us was open all night and had a "Men's Restroom" sign on the door.  The room across the hall from us was also open all night and contained a pile of lumber.  But the good news is that we did not have any neighbors.  All in all the trip has been really good so far (with the notable exception that it is snowing here in Indiana - although I did see that it was snowing in parts of Texas too, oh well).

Today we head out to my mother-in-law's house (or is that mother's-in-law house?) for a belated Thanksgiving dinner.  My mother and her boyfriend will be there along with my brother, his wife, my father and his wife.  It should be a good time (although I am sure the cat and dog are coming so we will see how that goes).  We brought two bottles of Beaujolais Nouveau.  We have never tried the stuff before so I hope it is good.  The dude from the wine section at the World Market store said we would probably like it (I think he thought we were not sophisticated wine drinkers, the fact that he was absolutely right is not important).  Hopefully we can bring some sort of culture to our family gathering.  If not, no big deal.

Well it is time to get ready for the day ahead including a much needed shower.  I will let you know how the dinner (and the wine) goes.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 238

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Tomorrow night we all pile into the minivan and head back to Indiana for vacation.  We were originally going to head out early Thanksgiving morning but I am pretty sure we will leave tomorrow afternoon (I am leaving work a little early) and then stopping somewhere in Missouri.  We will then make the balance of the drive on Thanksgiving Day.  Hopefully splitting it up this way will be worth the extra cost of the hotel.  This splitting up of the trip is for the most part due to the uncertainty that our new travel guest brings.  Gabby (our lab/spaniel puppy) will be making her first extended car trip and who knows how this will end up.  Our cat (Tiger) will probably entertain us with his one cat play titled "Gonna Meow 'Til Missouri" that he has done for us on ever trip so far.

Speaking of the cat (or as I am learning in Spanish - our "gato"), I think he is of Latin American heritage.  Like most cats, he will not come when you call him.  Very rarely (like once every other month) he will come to me (uncalled) and want to be petted and I can count on one hand the number of times he has jumped into my lap while I was sitting down on a chair.  This morning as I was sitting down in the living room and enjoying some early morning coffee with the wife, the cat was giving me one of those "You know I wouldn't hate it if you got up, came over to where I am, and petted me" looks.  He gives these to me quite often (perhaps this is just his natural look - who knows).  Anyway, I was comfortable and was not going to get up so like an idiot I began to call to him to come to me.  He flicked his tail a bit but did not move.  I then spoke to him, "Señor Gato..." and his ears perked up.  I called to him again, "Señor Gato..." and he got up (slowly mind you) and walked over to my chair, hesitated a bit and then jumped into my lap.  I was stunned to say the least.  He stayed on my lap for about 2 minutes (which is fine since it was time for a refill anyway).  Maybe learning spanish will have benefits that I am not even aware of at this time.

I will let you know how the road trip with Señor Gato (and Señorita Perro) goes.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 237

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

As you can imagine, our free time is taken up with puppy raising.  Gabby (that is the dog's name) is half lab and half springer spaniel.  More specifically, she is 1/2 championship lab and 1/2 dog next door that doesn't know his place.  The puppies that resulted in this (unfortunate) coming together were given away for "free" (as my wife pointed out when she came home with the dog).  Now "free" is a relative term as the dog has been anything but free as far as cost is concerned.  She was free at the onset however since then there has been a steady stream of necessary purchases from a crate, to a leash to premium dog food to a chew bone to a food/water dish to an industrial size container of Nature's Miracle (by the way, this stuff really works).  Anyway, this dog has been eating up our free time in much the same way that she eats our curtains.

No conversation that my wife and I have can last more than 15 seconds before she has to pause, look for the puppy and do a "squat check" (this is EXACTLY what you think it is).  I can tell that I do not have my wife's attention lately.  I usually try a little trick to ensure she is paying attention to me.  I will throw in sentences to the story I am telling and see if she even reacts.  For instance...

Me: So I had an interview with my new boss today.
Her: Uh-huh
Me: He seems very nice and I am excited about working for him.
Her: (glances around for squatting dog) That's good.
Me: One thing though, he keeps a collection of severed heads in his office.
Her: Hmmm, that's nice.

Anyway I need to get going as it might be my turn on watch since the wife is bathing the daughter.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 236

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

I had a little work to be done this morning and I was working with a co-worker located in New Zealand.  This basically means that whatever complaining that I do about working at 11 AM on a Saturday is trumped by the fact that it was 6 AM on Sunday where he is located.  I was trying to explain this to my son and he could not grasp the concept that it was tomorrow there already (and for the most part it is always tomorrow there since they are 19 hours ahead of us now due to us falling back and hour and them springing forward an hour).  Anyway, due to the timing of all of this I did not get a chance to watch my son play his last soccer game of the season.

I have watched him many times over the past year or so.  If you were not an informed observer of his soccer playing skills you would swear that he and the soccer ball were of like magnetic charges.  It seems that no matter where the ball is, he is no closer than 15 foot from the ball.  The ball comes his way (along with the throng of 9 year old boys chasing it) and he moves a safe distance away.  That is not to say that he has not kicked the ball a few times but hey if you throw like charged magnets toward each other at a great enough velocity then they will actually touch (before being repelled at a greater rate of speed).  So while I was monitoring the work at home and the daughter was watching Monsters, Inc. for like the 1,000th time (our VHS tape is showing signs of wear), my son was maintaining his orbit around the ball.  He has fun so I guess it is ok but truth be told, he is more physical during a hand shake following a chess match than during a soccer match.  Starting next week though I get my Saturday mornings back for the most part.

On the home pet front, the cat is now not my least favorite pet.  He had been my favorite and least favorite for a while there when he was the only pet but since the hermit crabs he has dropped down the list.  However once the dog came along he did get off of the bottom of the list.  This seems to have no effect on him and in typical cat fashion I think he simply does not care.  We will see how the dog does and I will have to consider revising the list.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 235

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

And now for the pee report...

This is what I get each night now from my wife and my son.  The bodily function overview for the day for our dog (Gabby).  I did not ask for this information in any way.  I did not request it formally or informally.  I did not sign up for the newsletter.  I did not subscribe to a newsfeed.  Nor do I even pretend to be interested at all while they are telling me this.  This does not discourage them in the least bit however from doing the telling until the telling is done.

I suppose this is not unlike a new parent telling stories of diapers, etc (I am never interested in this either by the way).  The wife went into a montage tonight with the good report (the dog going to the door) and the bad report (noting several spots that might still be wet - there was even a tour de pee noting the spots).  From what I can tell so far of dog ownership, the pee report is all there really is from a newsworthy point of view.  Sad to think that this is the case.  After sitting through the report for the day (and indicating several times that I did not need or want this information) the wife and I headed to the church to pick up the kids from AWANA.  After we got back into the van, my son launched a recap of the report (although he stressed other facts than the wife's version did).  Sigh, what's a (unwilling) dog owner to do?

Aren't you glad though that you can share in my pain?  I thought so.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 234

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well I have finally done it.  I have ordered some software that will help me (and my family) learn Spanish.  Ever since travelling to Argentina this year (actually right about when I learned that I would be heading to Argentina) I had decided in my mind that I would learn some Spanish.  There are cheap software titles that you can get at any computer store (I saw one for only $10 at Staples the other day) but I had my heart set on Rosetta Stone.  I have heard great things about it and have been to the booth at the most recent home school convention here near Dallas.  I had done the research during the spring and summer and had to put off the purchase month after month as it did not fit into my budget.  Today though I made the order and am looking forward to starting.

Everyone that I have dealt with thus far in Argentina (and recently Mexico) has spoke English very well but soon I will be working on a project where some users only speak Spanish (and Portuguese - which I have no interest in learning).  So, a little Spanish might come in handy.  I actually took 2 years of French in high school and 2 more years in college.  I won't go into the details of why I cannot speak any French but it has to do with the fact that my college professor showed up drunk to class a few times and actually took an entire class once to tell (in vivid detail) how he lost his virginity to a Mexican prostitute.  He even told the story in English (not that the same story in French would have constituted a lesson but I would have been a little more lenient).  At any rate, I cannot speak French or any other language other than my native tongue.  Hopefully that will change soon.  There are a few people in my local office that speak Spanish very well too so I should be able to get some feedback about my progress.

Another thing I have wanted to do for a long time is to learn to play the guitar.  My mother even bought me a guitar once but other than checking out a self teaching video from the library I have no guitar skills.  I did learn how to tune the guitar and I might still be able to do that if I needed to however since I do not even know the simplest of chords I doubt if I could tell if the guitar was tuned properly.  Maybe after a few months of practicing Spanish I might attempt the guitar again.  But it would need to be a spanish guitar I think.  I wonder if tuning a spanish guitar is different (man I hope not, if so I would truly have to start over).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 233

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

I am excited as today is the Patriots - Colts game.  Today I find out if my beloved Colts are legit contenders for those Patriots or not.  I am a little scared of the answer actually (shhh, don't tell anyone).

My son is excited today for a totally different reason.  Today (or yesterday if you wanted to do it early) we get to set our clocks back one hour.  I think I have mentioned before his fascination with clocks.  As simple of a thing as a power outage gives him joy as that means that all clocks without batteries have to be reset.  He has no control over power outages so those are just happy surprises for him,  Today however is one of only 2 annually scheduled times when he knows he gets to do this.  I am just happy that I get to sleep in another hour.

Which has me thinking.  What a waste of an extra hour.  I mean, I could use an extra hour on a weekday infinitely more that I could use it on a Sunday.  Springing ahead an hour (done now on the second Sunday in March due to the Energy Policy Act of 2005) can stay on a Sunday since Sunday is a great day to lose an hour.  But, Come On!  Let's be practical here as a 25 hour Sunday is about as useful as a 24 hour one in my book.

Well I am going to head up to the front of the house now and find a way to kill an hour.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 232

Here is what came home with the wife and kids today.  I am sure this new item will make a few blogs in the near future.

Jon

Blog Number 231

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well DSL is up and running (kind of) here at home so after a long time between blogs written at home...

I say that DSL is working but it is a little spotty.  It tends only to work for about 20 minutes at a time before a modem reset is needed.  As the days go by, it lasts longer with each modem reset and we are up to about 45 minutes between resets now so who knows what's going on really.  Tonight we had 11 people in our house as my mother, grandmother and aunt are staying with us from Indiana.  My uncle from California came over with his daughter and (soon to be) son-in-law (they live here near Dallas).  Finishing off the count was another cousin (or 3rd cousin I think) that lives near here as well.  Everyone had a great time and it was fun catching up.  Everyone who is staying with us is flying home tomorrow so it will be back to normal before we know it.  We are heading back to Indiana the week after Thanksgiving so we will only be in this normal state for a few weeks.  Then it will be Christmas before you know it and then maybe we can truly get back to normal.

It is getting late but I wanted to update you on my DSL service and let you know the blog is back.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 230

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

I do not have a lot of time for a blog entry today.  My DSL service is not turned on for my home yet so this entry is from work where I am finished putting in a few Saturday hours.  My phone service IS turned on however.  Once I signed up for phone / DSL service, I dug out a phone and plugged it into the wall jack at home so I could check from time to time to see if the service was turned on.  AT&T gave me my new phone number but of course it is useless until the whole thing is hooked up.  My wife called me from home yesterday afternoon to tell me that the phone was indeed turned on.  She did not find this out by occasionally picking up the receiver and listening for a dial tone.  No, she found this out when she came home from running some errands and heard a phone ringing in our house.  Mind you it has been over 2 months since we have heard this sound and so it seemed odd to her at first and could not register what was really happening.  Once she ran to the back of the house where the phone was, she answered the phone (of course).  It was not me on the end of the line nor was it AT&T confirming service activation.  No, it was someone wanted to sign us up for a credit card!  Our first call was a (insert expletive here) telemarketer.  Now I remember why I did not hook the phone up immediately when I moved.  As of this morning, DSL was not working so hopefully it will be up and going by Monday.  Have a nice rest of the weekend (mine starts now).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 229

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Man, another day, another one of those meetings.  Thursdays are brutal anyway but the meeting I am in now it especially merciless in its viciousness.

I will let everyone know that I signed up for a phone line and DSL service yesterday with AT&T.  The house I am leasing is so new that the automated system on their site does not even recognize my address.  As such, I cannot use the online form to request new service.  Because of that, I have to pay the full price since the specials only apply if you use the online system.  Another added touch (along with the activation fees) of dealing with a live human when requesting new service is that they try to talk you into other services that I don't want.  Ultimately I had the same conversation that I had about this time last year when all I wanted was the basest phone service that would allow me to use the DSL service.  After much discussion (mostly on the part of the AT&T person) I was able to convince them to sign me up for their $4.20 / month phone service allowing me 25 local calls per month since I made a grand total of one phone call in the 13 months I had this service in my apartment.  Doing the math, the one phone call that I made cost me about $50.  I made this point ad nausea to the phone rep when they kept trying to talk me into a higher costing service.  Once that was solved, a discussion ensued about the speed of internet access that I would need.  I wanted the $20 / month service (even though there was a higher speed available for $5 more - a point that the rep made no less than a half dozen times).  Just when I thought I was done with the call, they once again tried to sell me caller ID, call waiting, etc. on my phone line that I previously mentioned (several times) that I would never use.

Anyway, I got through that call (who would have thought that a deterrent to having phone / DSL service would be dreading the call to sign up?) and I should have service soon.  This will allow me to get back to regular blogging and also allow my wife to get email again (something she was only able to do once a week when she went to the library).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 228

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well I am in the middle of another one of "those" meetings but I wanted to divert my attention for a moment to share with you a (not so) new pet peeve of mine.  This has to do with my wife, yawning and talking.

Since we have no internet or cable TV at home, this has allowed (or perhaps forced) my wife and I to talk more.  We discuss all kinds of things from a newspaper article to a book that one of us is reading.  Our discussions have gone up a notch for sure since we are not talking about the latest episode of a TV show or a you tube video.  One (bad) habit the that wife has is not pausing her speech during a yawn.  She just keeps on trucking through her sentence and makes a valiant effort to enunciate during the yawn but try as I might, I cannot decipher her words.  There are times that I can fill in the blanks based on the words immediately before or after the yawn but for the most part the yawn lasts too long and the missing data is too large for me to make an accurate guess.

Perhaps I do not yawn as much as most people but I generally pause during the yawn.  Maybe I cannot multitask (yawning and talking at the same time) and need to focus all my mental capacities to completing the yawn.  The only time I can remember yawning during talking is when I am reading a book to the kids.  I yawn every 2 or 3 pages for some reason and it is a little frustrating for me but trying to speed up the yawn does not seem to help anything and probably causes more frequent yawns.  But I do pause for the yawn and do not try to muddle through the book (plus I am reading C. S. Lewis and most of his words are important and skipping even a sentence might cause problems).  The wife however (despite my calling attention to this annoying habit each time) still continues on with her talking.  She always has to repeat her words.  To me that would be a deterrent.  To her it is not.

Anyway, I have to pay attention to this meeting now as I know I heard my name at least once.  Until (y a w n) next (y a w n) time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 227

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well I have a few minutes here while my computer is installing some software that has made all other software programs come to a grinding halt.  Even my browser is sluggish (but not so sluggish that I cannot write this blog entry).

Once again, it is Jean Week here at my employer.  As you might recall from previous blog entries, this is the week where you can pay a certain amount of money and then wear jeans every day of the week.  I have previously mentioned that in order to raise even more money, my company could have a fund raiser where folks like myself could donate money and disallow certain people from wearing jeans.  I don't think I will offend too many people when I say that there are certain people in our society that should not be allowed to wear certain articles of clothing (jeans being one of them).  Anyway, the whole fund raiser concept has got me thinking.

My cubicle is located near 2 large network printers that are used by almost everyone in my area.  That is to say, almost everyone except me.  I have been pretty much paperless for the last 5+ years and have been preaching to all those that would hear of the merits of the avoidance of killing trees in order to have a paper copy of a document.  Few have listened but I have a few converts and I think slow and steady will win the race and I am just ahead of my time in this matter.  Anyway, the printers that are near me seldom work correctly for any length of time.  There are various techniques to "fixing" these printers but the majority of the solutions involve brute force.  The brute force type solutions also (evidently) require some sort of profanity to have the desired effect.  Now, since I spent a lot of my life in a bowling alley, I will tell you that I am not learning any new words or phrases per se, however I am learning new uses for the same old words.  At any rate, I think that if we installed a "swear jar" near the printers in my area (and probably all over my company) then we could raise an amount that would far exceed the Jean Week total.  We could have a posted list (printed out of course to emphasize the irony) of words and the cost for their use.  Other suggestions I have would include a quantity discount for those who wish to say many words all in the same printing session.  Perhaps we could pre-pay for words and use then as needed.  The possibilities are quite endless.

Anyway, there is my thought.  Like others I have had, it will not be utilized.  Such is life.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 226

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Saturday we were invited to a birthday party.  Let me clarify the word "we" here as it is slightly important to the big picture.  Originally I thought that "we" only included my daughter (who is the same age as the birthday boy) and my son (who is the same age as the birthday boy's older brother).  I also assumed that my wife would stay as she is very good friends with the birthday boy's mother.  I was informed on Saturday morning that I was also included in the "we" and as such, I went.  There was going to be pizza and cake so that soothed the issue a little in giving up part of my Saturday however given that I worked for about 6 hours last Saturday and that the mother-in-law and sister-in-law were with us for part of this past week, I was really looking forward to doing nothing this weekend.

The party was a costume party and more specifically it was a Star Wars themed costume party.  There ended up being a Boba Fett, a Princess Leia, an Anakin Skywalker (the birthday boy), a Storm trooper, and at least 3 Darth Vader's.  I went as "My Son's Dad" which (if you did not know this) was a minor character in Star Wars III - Revenge of the Sith.  I will forgive you if you missed the scene he was in as it was not central to the story.

One thing that was set up for an activity was a piñata in the form of Darth Vader's head.  They had this head strung up from a tree with some white rope and (I will be honest here) it looked a little scary and (given the recent issues our neighboring state has had with nooses lately) perhaps a little out of place.  The kids lined up from smallest to biggest to take turns whacking this thing.  The rope broke after 2 hits from the first kid and then (after an attempt to string it back up) it fell again.  At this point in time I think i would have given up, cracked the thing open and then pass out the candy.  The dad of the birthday boy was a little more committed than I and decided to hold the piñata and let the kids take turns.

Now I have seen this scenario played out on countless episodes of America's Funniest Home Videos and I'm telling you (for those of you who have lived under a rock and have never seen this) it never ends up good for the dad (or whoever is holding the rope).  Statistics show that a full 98% of the time, male reproductive organs are damaged (much to the chagrin of the studio audience).  I had a choice here now, I could look away squeamishly or I could pick up the video camera and try to win $10,000.  In the end I watched through my fingers of my hand that I had over my face during the final few whacks that sent the candy flying everywhere.  All ended well fortunately though my daughter (who didn't quite get the concept of hitting the head of something to explode it so you can get candy) seemed relieved after candy came out (and not some other bodily fluids).

In the end the kids had a good time, the pizza was pretty good and we got out in about 2 hours.  The wife then left me at home with the kids while she spent the next 4 hours at a neighbor's house at a combo Pampered Chef / Mary Kay party.  In the end my Saturday was shot but such is life.  At least I didn't have to hold the piñata (or watch some guy take it in the midsection doing so).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 225

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

I would like to code this as a "boring meeting blog" with your permission.  My life at work is getting exciting with more and more projects that I am involved with on a day to day basis.  It is great for my career and things overall are going great.  The one side effect of this however is that I have many more meetings that I have to attend.  Most meetings are important (or have the potential of being important) but there is the occasional meeting that I attend that (although mandatory to attend) really serves no purpose other than to have the ability to say that we have had a meeting.

At this very moment I am in one of "those" meetings.  To be sure it is an important meeting, I just do not need to pay attention (other than to listen for my name in case someone needs my input).  During these types of meetings usually I surf the web, catch up on email, or instant message with other people that are also non-players in the meeting and make pithy (or not so pithy) comments about the current speaker.

These meetings make for good irony in my life.  I get nothing accomplished on days that involve many meetings.  I feel horrible on days where I feel like I accomplished nothing and as such I have come many days with a look on my face that my wife can interpret as a "day full of meetings" look.  I cannot imagine being a manager and having nothing but meetings to look forward to when I arrive to work.

Thursdays are particularly bad for me as I start my day off with back to back to back one hour meetings and then play catch up the rest of the day.  The good news for me today though is that a two hour meeting scheduled for this afternoon was postponed for a few weeks so things are looking up for the day.

Well this meeting is winding down and I have to pay attention to the last few minutes as it is at this time that "action items" are handed out and you want to make sure I am not given something to do that I do not want to do.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 224

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Let me take a minute here before I start my workday and tell you about the latest addition to our household.  We are now the proud owners of a hermit crab.  It seems that last week the wife took the kiddies to the local mall and there was a kiosk selling hermit crabs.  The thing that drew the kids to this particular vendor was the brightly painted shells that the hermit crabs were living inside.  Among the many designs were the superman logo, the batman logo, etc.  Now as a person who sees through these kinds of marketing ploys, I was immediately skeptical.  However the daughter would not stop talking about these crabs and the next day they made a trip back to the mall to see what the cost was.  The wife called me at work to inform me that she felt she could talk the lady at the kiosk down from $20 to $15 (which included the crab, the shell [of course], a small cage and about 2 weeks worth of crab food).  Given that the daughter was so enamored with these creatures, I caved in and OK'ed the purchase.

I will admit the little guy was kind of neat to watch as he scurried around the little cage.  The wife then checked out a book from the library and immediately discovered that we were doing a great disservice to the crab (by the way, the crab's name is Michael as in Michael Landon) by leaving him in this small cage.  I deciphered this message to mean that $15 was only the beginning of my expenses related to hermit crab ownership.  $30 more dollars later we have a bigger cage, another shell (in case he gets tired of his bright yellow shell with the owl painted on it), a cuttlebone, a small palm tree (which he uses to climb and then hang up side down from the new cage lid), and a better watering sponge.  I can tell this is only the start of a windfall of crab related purchases coming to my credit card bill soon.  Per the book we have, they are social creatures so it is really not fair only to have one crab.  Perhaps we need 2 or 3.  Also, the cage we just bought will not be big enough for more than one crab so a new, bigger cage will be needed.

Sigh, I suppose after going all of September without spending a dime, I was due for $100 worth of useless spending that gains me nothing (other than my daughter's gratitude).  I will have to post some pictures soon of Michael so you can see where my money is going.

I do not know if this blog entry is my official return or not to semi regular blogging so don't get your hopes up too much.  However I have heard from several of you recently so this blog is a direct result of your complaints of the lack of blogs.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 223

Greetings,

Well our family survived our "don't spend a dime" month of September.  We did very well but did cheat a little last Saturday and spent $20 on lunch.  In all fairness, we found the $20 so it was not in our normal budget.  I don't have time to go into the details but being such a stickler for the rules you will have to trust me that we did not cheat.  We have almost decided that we are not going to have a phone line installed.  We have also almost decided that we are not going to set up high speed internet (since we are not installing a phone line then that rules out dial up).  Some close friends of ours don't know quite how to respond to our actions.  In fact they have threatened to have an intervention should we take the next logical step and sell the cars and buy a horse and buggy.  Anyway, I just wanted to touch base with you all.  I have almost 9 hours of meetings scheduled at work today (hmm sounds like a good blog subject).

Jon

Blog Number 222

Greetings,

Well it has been 3 weeks now with no internet access or phone at home.  We are past the half way point for our self imposed "don't spend a dime" rule for September and we are holding up OK.  I just wanted to drop a note to let everyone know that I have not fallen off the face of the earth but given our lack of access to the outside world from our home we might as well have.  I have (almost) gotten out of the habit of looking at events in my life as possible blog subjects so hopefully when (if) I return I will not have lost my touch.  Until then...

Jon

Blog Number 221

Greetings,

I have gone "off the grid" and still do not have internet access (or a home phone as I have cancelled my Vonage account).  I do not have an ETA of when I might get internet hooked up at the house we moved into recently.  The wife and I have declared September a "no spend month" and are giving up a lot of things to pay for the extra expenses associated with moving (not the least of which is the really cool new washer and dryer we purchased at the local scratch & dent shop).  Do not worry, we have water, electricity, food, etc. (the necessities).  We are just going to "rough it" for September and see how it goes.  Thanks to all you who have been asking about the blog.  I truly do have a LOT to write about (don't get me started on the sprinkler system!).  I hope to be back soon.

Jon

Blog Number 220

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well today is the day!  Moving day has finally arrived.  The kids are...well they are excited but that hardly covers it.  The kids constant reminder of the countdown of the days that remain until we move can only be compared to the anticipation of Christmas.  The guys from Two Men and a Truck are due here in about 30 minutes so now we are just waiting (other than the wife who is cleaning the bathroom one last time).  We actually could get into the house on Saturday so we have made (8) trips to the house with the van loaded down.  It is about 8 miles to the new house.  Actually we did discover a short cut that brought it down to 5.  Mr. Google was not aware of the road that was just built near our house so I don't blame him for not knowing that we could take a shorter route.

There really is no comparison between the apartment and the house we are moving to.  I will have to show you some pictures to show you how much of an improvement we are moving into (and pictures of how we have lived for the last 12+ months).  For now though you will have to trust me.

I have to go now.  If the wife catches me blogging while she is cleaning the bathroom it would not be good.  One last note, I have NOT signed up for high speed internet at the new house yet so I have no idea how long it will be until my next blog (unless I can find a wireless connection somewhere that is "free").  Until then...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 219

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well today is moving day (or more specifically, day 1 of the moving days).  The movers will not be here until Monday but we bought a few boxes at the local storage place and are going to start moving what we can today since today is the first day we can get into the house.  So today will be a busy (read: no fun) day for the kids.  I think once we make a trip or two, the kids will start to get more excited but we will have to wait and see I suppose.

I have spent the last week stopping and starting electricity, water, gas, internet and phone services which is not a lot of fun.  I has gotten easier though since the last time we moved.  You can even do the forwarding of your mail over the internet (for a $1 charge).  Also, the water service for McKinney, TX, can be done online.  Furthermore, the gas and electric service is through the same company so that was a breeze.  If you know me then you know what I am thinking:

This is all going a little too easy.  Something catastrophic will ensue shortly.

I am just waiting for something to break, quit working, etc.  Or for some hidden, huge fee to come up and slap me from out of nowhere.  I can only liken this feeling to the feeling you have when walking through a haunted house.  You know something is going to jump out of nowhere and so you are tensed up in anticipation.  That is a very good analogy of the way I have felt this week and I am even at a higher level heading into today.

Well, I have a lot of stuff to do, I will keep you posted if a monster jumps out to get me.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 218

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

I received a phone call around noon today.  It was my wife calling to inform me that our daughter lost another tooth.  She lost one last week as well.  She was making sure that I had some $1 bills since the tooth last week caught us off guard and the daughter's tooth turned into $5 (we did not have anything smaller than a 5).  Anyway, I did not have anything smaller than a $10 so it was time to walk over to the bank.  Actually it is a credit union and they have a branch inside the building where I work.  They are renovating their normal location so I had to go down the escalators, through the cafeteria and then back up the escalators in order to get to their temporary location.  There was a small line when I got there (I did not make it over there until about 2 pm) and so I chatted with the lady behind me in line and explained my predicament.  She recalled losing one of her Sacajawea dollars that she was saving when one of her children suddenly lost a tooth.  Another time she had to give up a $2 bill she was saving.  She wished me luck and then I headed back the way I came and made the 2-escalator trip.

While on the escalator I wondered if there were guidelines on how fast the moving stairs can move.  Is there some sort of OSHA guideline on the speed?  Well it turns out that is is not OSHA that sets the standards, it is actually ASME (American Society of Mechanical Engineers) and the code outlining escalators is: ASME A17.1 - Safety Code for Elevators and Escalators (Includes Requirements for Elevators, Escalators, Dumbwaiters, Moving Walks, Material Lifts, and Dumbwaiters With Automatic Transfer Devices).  Since these are published guidelines managed by ASME, they are not free so I could not research the safety guidelines for speed.  I have been on many of these things in my life and I can say (with some authority) that the ones in my building could use a little more speed.

It took 25 seconds to get from the bottom to the top (or the top to the bottom depending).  I used the a very accurate measurement when timing my ride (1 Mississippi, 2 Mississippi, etc.) and all my trips were close to 25 seconds (or Mississippi's if you like).  I think that the company could save some money if they cranked up the speed.  Let's assume the following for the sake of this blog...

1. There are 5,000 people in my building.
2. Each person uses the escalator twice per day (once up and once down).
3. Each person makes $25 / hour.
4. Each person works 230 days a year at this building (figuring for weekends, holidays, travel days, sick days and vacations).
5. Every second saved in escalator travel will be spent in productive work (this is the biggest assumption!).
6. ASME will allow us to increase the speed such that it only takes 20 seconds to get from the top to bottom (or bottom to top) of the escalator

Ok, if you are buying this premise so far we have this...

1. Each person makes about 0.7¢ per second
2. Each person will save 10 seconds per day (5 seconds per trip for 2 trips) for a total savings per day per person of $0.07.
3. For 5,000 people, the per day savings will be $350.00.
4. For 230 days, the annual savings is $80,500.00.

Now this may seem like craziness to you but I have seen some other proposed cost savings measures and this one is more feasible than most and the data is far more accurate (and can be backed up).  I had to use the escalators 4 times today just to make change and could have saved $0.14.  I did make good use of my 100 seconds on the escalators though, I basically wrote this blog in my head while going up and down (and up and down).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 217

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

I left work right at 5:00 today.  Traffic is not bad at all unless I stay until around 5:30.  By 6:00, it is much worse.  I park in a garage and have to navigate around two large circular drives before I even get out to the road that I take to and from work each day.  Behind me today was a little, blue, convertible Mercedes.  The top was down and the guy in the car appeared to be ready for the weekend.  I was on a small road that connects the two circles that I have to drive around (the circles only go one way) when all of a sudden a security truck came out of an entrance.  He did not appear even to look for traffic and I had to hit the breaks pretty hard.  I did not really come close to hitting them but if I had not been paying attention there could have been trouble.  I was going to let everything go at that and get back on my way home.  However, the blue Mercedes dude had other thoughts.  He honked his horn (a little to long and loud for my taste) and then passed me and passed the security truck.  He offered a choice hand gesture to the driver of the truck (not THE hand gesture but a hand jester all the same).  He then sped past the truck and went away.  I decided to stay behind the truck and follow him around the circle.  He ended up turning off before I did but when I came to the stop light I saw Mr. Attitude in his little blue car.  For all his speeding around he accomplished very little (other than being 3 cars ahead of me in line for the light).  Once the light turned green, he began to speed up and weave in and out of the lanes to better his position.  But no matter what he tried, I caught him at the light.  By the time I was turning onto another street, he was still only 20 foot or so ahead of me.  These kinds of drivers are a pet peeve of mine.  I actually blame NASCAR.  I think these rush hour jockeys get a little too much Jimmy Johnson in their blood when they get behind the wheel.  I will admit that for all my frustration in watching him drive, I did get a pretty good feeling when I would see him drumming his fingers waiting at the same light that I arrived at while driving the speed limit and staying in my lane.  That put a smile on my face.  If I were bolder, I would have gotten out of my car while the light was still red and let him know that my 4 door Buick was making just as good time as his Speed Racer unit was.  But seeing as how he works at my company, it would be my luck that he is an upper level manager or something and it would all bite my in the end.  At any rate, I got home at the normal time (and probably beat him home).  Also, it is the weekend so all is well.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 216

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Today the decision that we made many years ago to have a second child has backfired on me.  The wife volunteered to make 4 1/2 dozen cookies for our church so tonight she is making them.  She uses the electric beater to mix up the dough and the mixer only has two beaters...

Quickly doing the math, if each kid gets a beater, then there is none for dear old dad.  This was not always the case.  Up until recently, the daughter had no interest in licking the beater.  Now however she is all about getting her own beater.  I also used to get to lick the bowl and then the wife purchased some really good spatulas (curse you Pampered Chef!) and so the bowl is pretty clean by the time she is done scraping out the last of the cookie dough.  So I don't get a beater and I don't got to lick the bowl!  And (to top if off) tonight, these cookies are not even for me!!
Overall, deciding to have a second child was a good decision.  My daughter has brought me much joy during her life.  Tonight however, as I watch her stroke her tongue all around the crevices of the beater...

Well anyway, I might have to make a Kroger run for some cookies tonight after the kids head off to bed.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 215

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well today was another 100° day here in Texas.  This is about what it was like when we moved down here except it is more humid now compared to then.  Tonight was soccer evaluation.  Both kids are playing soccer this summer / fall.  The son is doing so because he has done it in the past and enjoyed it.  The daughter is doing so because she wanted these shin guards...

As soon as she saw these pink shin guards at Target earlier in the year, she was convinced she was going to play soccer next session.

Tonight being evaluation night, both kids showed up (in the heat) and did a myriad of tests (throw the ball, kick it far and straight, run, kick the ball around some pylons, etc.).  They were each scored accordingly and the scores will be used to put them on teams of kids with similar skill levels (or lack thereof).  What does this really mean to me?  Well I am glad you asked.  Basically it means that (more than likely) the kids will have soccer practice on separate nights and have games at different times on games days.  Translation: my Monday nights, Tuesday nights and Saturday mornings are claimed for the next few months.  Oh well.

The daughter also lost a tooth today.  I believe I have mentioned how we handle lost teeth in my house.  You put it under your pillow and the tooth turns into money.  We do not believe (or encourage belief) in the tooth fairy.  The son has reached the age where he is convinced that I am switching the tooth for money.  I explained to him that when he stops believing that the tooth turns to money then they will most certainly stop.  Hallelujah, he is a believer again.  Anyway, very soon (slightly after I finish this blog) the daughter's tooth will magically turn into money (I hope).  The son has purchased Spy Gear (like this Alarm Kit that has a key code that he has installed on his door) and has threatened to booby trap their room.  I tell you my mom had it easy.  I slept hard and was happy with a quarter or two.  The daughter is convinced she will get $5 and I have to "break into" her room in order to give it to her.  A dad's job is never easy.  Wish me luck.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 214

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

I am trying to enjoy the things that I like about this apartment as much as I can since in two week we are outta here.  One thing that is very nice is the apartment video library.  It rotates monthly and has quite a few hit DVDs that you can borrow.  There are rules (like only keeping the movies for 2 days) but they are not enforced.  At any given time there are about 50 titles available but there are days when the pickin’s are slim.  The kids and I watched Rocky Balboa last night (it was not too bad).  The wife and I also watched Casino Royale this week.

When I got home earlier this evening I decided to change clothes and then walk up to the office and see what movies they had today.  As I was walking I heard quite a bit of chirping coming from under one of the carports so I investigated and found this...

These 4 chicks were way up under the carport.  I had to hold the camera at arms length over my head and step on my tip toes to get the picture.  Mama bird did not seem to happy so I got out of there.  Once I brought the picture home and showed it to the kids I noticed how ugly these small birds really are.  I zoomed in on the picture of the bird on the far right and it reminded me of the Skeksis in The Dark Crystal.  But do not take my word on it, judge for yourself...

 

Enough said.  Perhaps young chicks were Jim Henson's inspiration for the terrible Skeksis characters.  At any rate, I talked with a few guys that were also looking for movies and ended up picking up The Brothers Grim.  I will have to let you know how it is.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 213

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

So the semi-big news is that we are staying in Texas.  Most of you will not see this as big news since you did not even know that we were considering NOT staying in Texas.  So perhaps the semi-big news is that we were considering leaving Texas (going back to Indiana) and the also-semi-big news is that we have decided to stay in Texas.  Anyway, that's the news.

Either way we went, my family has sacrificed enough for me during the past 12 months.  They moved from a 1,583 sq. ft. house on about 1/2 of an acre into this 1,150 sq. ft. apartment with no yard at all.  The kids went from having their own room to sharing a room (a concept they found exciting for about the first 6 months but is wearing thin now).  Everyone had to make new friends and hardly see the old friends at all.  The wife lost all her free, "no advance planning needed" babysitters.  We had to find a new home for our dog, Pongo (I think even the cat misses him, though I doubt Tiger would admit it).  Many, many sacrifices all made on my behalf so I could take a shot at advancing my career.

Don't get me wrong, we were not looking forward to leaving Texas.  We have found a great church, made some great friends and we very much like the weather.  Allen is a better city than Kokomo.  When the wife and I listed the pro's and con's of one state versus the other, they came up about even.  One thing on the side of Indiana was that we were going to keep our return a secret from almost everyone in Indiana.  The wife and I plotted about this quite often.  We were going to work with one or two people in Kokomo and get settled back into Kokomo.  Then we were going to have a contact there invite both our mothers and my wife's sister to a fake party (Tupperware, Pampered Chef, etc.) and give the address of the party as our new address.  We almost wanted to move back just to do this.  It would make for one great story to tell (and blog to write).

But in the end, the job is going pretty well and it would not be a wise decision career-wise for me to leave my company's headquarters and go back to the relatively small office back where I started.  Plus there is much more opportunity here then there ever was back there.  Yes, staying is the best and only choice really.

Our apartment lease is up at the end of this month so we needed to find a place to move to once we we're kicked out of here.  We crunched the numbers, found a price range for houses we could afford and in the end decided that leasing a house for a year was a better financial decision.  This gets us into a house at least (with a yard) but does not tie us down to what we can afford with my current income.  Perhaps in another year down here we will be able to afford a house that we like.  For now with us running out of time to find a place to live, we decided on leasing.  So in about 2 weeks we are moving.  I will be going up and down those same 19 steps that I did when we moved in here last year.  This year though the move will not be preceded by a 900 mile trip in a U-Haul (ah, memories).

So in the next few weeks you can expect blogs about the frustrations of moving (again).  I will try to make is so they are not just reruns.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 212

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Last Friday I woke up with my tooth hurting me.  That statement is almost entirely true were it not for the fact that the tooth that was hurting pretty much does not exist.  It was the tooth that I had worked on right before I left for Argentina in January.  The dentist took as much of the tooth as he possibly could (and still be able to do a crown rather than a root canal).  As such, it was my gum that was actually hurting (but it sure felt like a tooth ache).  It was not that bad on Friday but on Saturday and Sunday it was quite bad.  Assuming it was an infection (I was just praying I did not need to go back in and do the root canal thing) my wife decided to use one of her home remedies.  So for the last 5 days I have taken the following...

Garlic Bulb Fluid Extract - 2.0 ml  / 3 times a day
Extra Virgin Coconut Oil - 1 tablespoon / 2 times a day

I think the garlic portion is a natural antibiotic (the likely prescription - had I gone to the dentist) and I forget what in the world the coconut oil was supposed to do (the wife told me several times but I guess I was not paying attention).  I whined, complained, moaned, groaned, protested, and made faces all week but took my "medicine" anyway.  I must admit I am feeling much better.  My upper jaw still aches a little but the pain in my non-tooth is gone for the most part and I am on the way to full recovery.

We try to eat fresh garlic and we due use the coconut oil for most of our cooking (although we do use olive oil as well) so these are not uncommon to my body.  I am just not used to taking them all by themselves.  The garlic was mixed in with a few ounces of water (holding my nose to drink it) and the coconut oil was just taken on a tablespoon (it has no taste except the faintest hint of coconut and does not have a very oil feel in your mouth).  The garlic was about $10 for 15 "servings" and the coconut oil (if I remember correctly) was about $6 for a jar.  If you add it up, it is still much cheaper than a trip to the dentist and a prescription co-payment.  Honestly, the cheapness of it is the only reason I even opted for it.  I am just happy it worked (although having the wife gloat about it adds to the overall price a little ).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 211

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

The wife and I were able to catch a late afternoon nap yesterday (thanks Mom!) so we were up late last night.  We were watching an old Ellen DeGeneres stand up special on YouTube.  It was conveniently cut up into 7 parts (part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7).  While we were watching (and laughing until we cried), we noticed a small bug making his way across our dining room floor.  It was heading from the direction of our bedroom toward the kitchen.  From a bug's point of view this must have been quite a journey (the human equivalent of several miles I would guess).  As we watched him make his journey, we both noted that we had not really seen any live bugs while living in this apartment but since our cat was still back in Indiana and since our cat took care of any bugs then we agreed that this is why the bug was still alive.  I then suggested that he was some sort of scout bug sent on a mission.  I theorized that it had been many generations since a bug from his tribe had journeyed to the promised land (a.k.a. the kitchen).  It must have been quite an honor for him to have been selected (or perhaps he drew the short straw - I could also envision a long, horizontal line of bugs and the bug commander asking for a volunteer bug to step forward and then the entire tribe [except for this unfortunate bug] taking a step back).  Whatever reason it was, he was the lone bug on this mission.  I wondered if this was an honor for him or he saw it as more of a duty.  Perhaps he was trying to impress some lady bug back at base camp.  After we discussed this for a short period of time, I grabbed a Kleenex and scooped him up and sent him to the great (literally) trash can in the sky.  I wondered then what his final thoughts were.  Maybe in generations (or month's) past, there were those who survived the cat and made it back to warn the others.  I am sure they embellished the truth so make themselves look good in front of the other bugs.  The bug that made his way across our floor was probably on the lookout for a giant, furry creature with no claws.  A giant white blanket (Kleenex) probably was the furthest thing from his mind and even after he saw it coming, he probably did not even think it was dangerous.  I doubt if many bugs make it back after being attacked by the giant white blanket.  Oh, it might be a myth from 100 generations ago (when the previous renters were in this apartment, renters who were not as adept with the Kleenex as I).  The myth might suggest the blanket of doom but today's younger generations of bugs pay no attention to such wild tales of the ancient bugs.  This bug however, should have listened to the tales.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 210

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

The kids arrived home safe and sound yesterday afternoon.  They had very exciting stories to tell about their train ride from Illinois.  My mom however looked about like she had just spent 18 hours on a train with 2 small kids.  At any rate, it is nice to have the kids home.  This morning we all piled in the van and headed to Panera before meeting a realtor at a house that we are going to lease starting at the end of this month.  Oh, I forgot to mention that we are staying in Texas.  There was a slight chance that we were going to move back to Indiana.  In fact, while we were up there on vacation we did look around at apartments just in case we ended up back there.  We should be able to move into this house toward the end of this month.  I am sure I will have tales to tell about the move.

Last night we had our 2nd poker night with our ABF (Sunday School) class.  After the first poker night, a fellow participant went out and bought a really cool poker chip set and he has been eager to get to use it.  These chips are the real deal.  I was surprised how heavy they were.  He told me they were made partially out of metal (hence the weight).  They ordered Hungry Howie's pizza and everyone brought chips, pop and desert.  The get together started at 6:30 (ish) and poker did not actually start until closer to 8.  In all, there were 9 poker players (including 6 adults and a 12, 9 and 7 year old).  We passed out the chips, went over the rules and then dealt the cards.  I knew I was in trouble as I had a good (but not great) hand right off the bat.  My 2 pair was covered though by the 12 year old's straight.  She played in our first poker night and was the first one out of chips.  I could tell she had spent some time honing her skills since last time (of course getting a straight on the first hand helped too).  I folded a few hands and then thought I had a good hand again only to be disappointed but the river or the turn.  I played conservatively for a while and by the 10th hand or so I was needing to make a move.  I bet a ton on an Ace-Jack and hoped for the best.  I was pot committed and had 2 of the kids bidding me up so I went all in.  I got lucky with a 10 on the last card giving me a straight or else I would have been done.  That tripled my chip count and then I was good to go for a while.  One by one everyone dropped out until it was just me and the guy who owned the chips.  We each had about the same number of chips but he was slightly higher when I went all in and he called.  I won that hand which crippled him.  With the ante and blinds raised pretty high, he was able to crawl back in.  By 10 PM or so though I decided to go all in with a 10-8 and he called with a 7-6.  The flop had a 6 but also a 10 so I was better.  The next 2 cards didn't help either of us so I took the pile...

We joined the others in the other room and talked until about 11.  The daughter was already asleep and the son was looking a little haggard so we headed home.  We all agreed we needed to do this again soon so I will have to defend my title the next time.

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 209

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well it has been quite a week.  First off, the kids were still in Indiana with their grandmas while the wife and I enjoyed an empty apartment all to ourselves.  It is basically the first time in 9 years that we have had an empty home other than the occasional times both kids were staying overnight somewhere.  This is definitely the first time we have had multiple nights alone since before my son was born.  Tonight though the kids are on a train with my mother heading south towards Dallas.  They will arrive sometime after noon tomorrow and we are really ready to see them.  This week we have been practicing for when the time comes and the kids move out of the house.  I think we will do OK with the empty nest syndrome when we have to deal with it.

Tonight though the wife and I celebrated our last night alone and the anniversary of our first year in Texas by going out to Pan Acean.  This is a restaurant that we visited last July when we first came down to the Allen area to look for a place to live.  I think that this is the only Pan Acean anywhere (at least I could not find another one with the help of Mr. Google).  It is a very good Asian restaurant.  It is about 25 miles away and only 35 minutes if we took the toll road.  Being a cheapskate and since we had no one back at the apartment to come home to, we took the long route and arrived there in about 45 minutes.  The food was as good as we remembered (Pad Thai and Kung Pao along with some lettuce wraps) and we brought plenty home to reheat for lunch tomorrow.  When it came time to pay the bill I recalled the last visit to this restaurant.  We met my cousin and her (then boyfriend and now) fiance and he picked up the check.  So this is the first time I had to pay for food here.  Also with the check came some fortune cookies.  I chose mine carefully, then swapped with the wife, the swapped back again.  When I finally opened mine up there were 2 fortunes inside instead of the normal one.  I do not know if this is a sign of good luck or bad but here are my fortunes...

You will find your solution where you least expect it. - AND - Do not let great ambitions overshadow small successes.

I am not sure which one I like the best but I am leaning toward the second one right now.  The drive home was nice as we listened to NPR (National Public Radio).  For some reason I find this station interesting (even moreso than Jack FM which I also like).  NPR has all sorts of interesting stories and covers them from different angles than the normal news agencies.

For now though we just have what's left of tonight alone.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 208

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Well I have precious few hours left in my vacation.  Today was quite full.  We woke up at the normal time and without any kids to slow us down we found we were ready to go over an hour early.  We took the time to go for a walk.  There is a paved path that runs behind our apartment complex so we walked for about 30 minutes.  It was getting hot by the time we got back so we cooled down a little and then headed out to church.  Everyone (OK, 6 people) was happy we returned safe and sound.  The service was good and we ended up going to Pei Wei with some friends for lunch.  We came home, regrouped and then took a test run out to the train station.  My mom is bringing the kids home on Thursday and they are taking the train.  We found the station OK but could not find anywhere to park really.  We got a little lost on the way back (thank God for our compass) but after we drove around and found a street with a familiar name we ended up taking it.  We were very far south from where we needed to be and there were many stoplights.  What do we care?  We are still on vacation!  We shopped for some much needed groceries (the cupboards are bare) and we found yet another sub $10 wine that we are going to try out.  This wine is from Texas and we are hopeful that for $7 it might just be THE wine for us.  We did manage to stop by the apartment front office earlier in the day and picked out a few movies from their DVD library so the wife and I are ready to cuddle up on the couch, sip some wine, and enjoy a movie.  Tomorrow though it is back to work (sigh).

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 207

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

We left Kokomo this morning at 3:45 AM central time and 15 1/2 hours and 930 miles later, the wife and I arrived at home (sans kids).  Missouri was once again a killer.  What a boring state to drive through!  We did manage to visit a place we have drove by each time we drive to and from Indiana.  There is an Amish Cheese Shop in Chouteau, OK that we have always wanted to shop at but each time we went through that town the shop was closed (since we did not travel by it during normal business hours).  Well this time is was a Saturday in the early afternoon when we drove by it so we stopped in.  I sampled the chipotle pepper jack cheese (wow) and perused the store.  We ended up buying some preserves and apple butter at the cheese shop and some fresh bread and pineapple carrot cake at the bakery adjacent to it.  I feel I was a little ripped off though.  Since the store had Amish in the title I was expecting some good old fashioned Amish people to be there.  All that was there was a bunch of Mennonites.  Now don't get me wrong, the Mennonites are fine (there were several in my high school that I was friends with).  But when you are expecting the real deal, you feel a little let down.  After leaving the store we had a discussion in which the wife was convinced that we could convert to the Mennonite faith but when we listed all the things that we had to give up we decided against it (one of the things I would have to give up is owning a computer and thus blogging - my blog would be a piece of paper nailed to the tree).

At any rate, the weather was nice the entire drive and now we are exhausted (and still Baptist and not Mennonite).  We are going to enjoy a good nights sleep back in our own bed.  Until next time...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon

Blog Number 206

Greetings and welcome to today's random thought.

Today is the last true day of vacation.  The wife and I are heading back to Texas early tomorrow morning and that will eat up our whole Saturday.  Sunday I am sure will be church and unpacking and getting the apartment back in order.  So that leaves today.  We are meeting with friends tonight and this afternoon we are visiting my grandma as the assisted living center she lives in is having an ice cream social.

The kids were still with their grandma so the wife and I had the morning to ourselves.  We met my mom and her boyfriend for breakfast and then headed to the Indiana Department of Revenue to try to clear up my state tax mystery.  The State of Indiana sent us a refund check equal to about twice what we paid for the entire year in taxes.  I noticed their error immediately and probably could have called them but I thought it would be easier to explain it in person so we headed to the local office here in town.  It only took 3 minutes and the ladies there could not have been nicer.  They thanked me for my honesty but promptly took the nice big check from me without offering a reward.

As I mentioned in my last blog, the wife and I went golfing on Wednesday morning.  We went to Rice's Golf Center which is a small par 3 course here in Kokomo.  We went into the clubhouse and paid for 9 holes of golf and then bought 4 used golf balls (just in case we lost a few on the course) and borrowed some clubs (7 iron, 9 iron and putter for each of us).  We opted to play the "short nine" which means we play the shortest nine holes on the course based on yardage.  This means hole 1 and then holes 11 through 18.  The longest hole is 100 yards and for the most part you could throw the ball to the green from the tee if you wanted to.  This is my kind of golf and the perfect way to introduce the wife to the sport (though she has been to a few driving ranges in her life).  Here are our scores...

Let me start off by saying that for this being the wife's first attempt at golf, she did great.  Now for the rest of this paragraph I will poke fun at her.  She asked me early in the week why we would go golfing.  I simply replied that it would be something to blog about.  So she knew going in that the entire outing would be documented with my commentary.  After a few pointers from me (which I am sure did not help in the least bit) she managed to hit the ball on her second swing off the first tee.  As she tapped in for what she thought was a four I had to inform her that her first swing (that missed everything) actually counted.  She hesitantly penciled in a five and moved on.  During the round I showed her various places where I or a playing partner had hit our tee shots.  I do remember playing hole 13 once and a fellow golfer hit a tree real close to the tee and was actually behind the tee once the ball stopped rolling.  This caused him to have to hit again before we teed off since technically he was "away".  Good times!  I finally hit a good tee shot on 14 and sank an 8 footer for my lone birdie of the day.  You would think this would have made me feel good but since I did not have any more good tee shots on the balance of the holes, it only served to remind me how inconsistent I am.  The wife hit a ball into a fence line on hole 15 and I dug the pretty orange ball that she was playing with out of some thorn bushes.  It was not until I got to the green that I notice that I had a lot of blood on the back of my hand from retrieving the ball.  I made a point of showing the wife how much I would go through for her (even though I did not feel any pain and it took me 5 minutes even to realize that I was bleeding).  When we arrived at hole 18, I pointed to some mowing equipment to the (way) right of the fairway and noted I had been there several times.  She promptly deposited the ball underneath said equipment.  It was behind a shed of sorts and since we were on the last hole anyway we basically threw the ball back into the fairway (hence the * by my wife's score on the last hole).  If not for a 3 putt on 15, I would have been satisfied with my round.  Since I have not played in about 10 years I don't think I did that bad.  I did, however, learn a few new golfing rules.  Be sure to note these for your next outing...

Section 3 Paragraph 2b: If said player is teeing off of the first hole and if it is their first time playing the sport of golf, any swings that do not result in the ball actually moving do NOT count in the stroke count.

Section 13 Paragraph 6c: If a player hits the ball slightly with the club so that the ball falls off the tee, the player can use the one time per round qualifier, "That does not count, there was a bee on me" rule.  The player will not be penalized the stroke.  This will also qualify for any winged creature that may or may not have a stinging apparatus.  The winged creature must be witnessed by at least one more player in order to qualify.

When we got back to the house the kids were back home and the daughter was sick to her stomach.  She has eaten rather poorly (nutrition-wise) while on vacation (as have we all) but it particularly effected her.  We hung around the house the rest of the day.

Yesterday I went into a local business where I used to do a lot of computer work.  They had a to do list for me and then I hitched a ride to the local building for the place where I work and went to lunch with some co-workers.  The restaurant we wanted to go to actually had a small sign on the door that said, "Closed until Aug. 23rd" so we opted for plan B.  The food was OK but we had a good time catching up.  We went to dinner with friends last night out to the city of Greentown.  Greentown has exactly one stop light.  I used to live there ages ago and my brother used to own a restaurant in the same building as the one we ate at.  We know the wife of the family that runs the business and her husband is from Italy so the Italian food was great.  I had the Gnocchi Amanda (named after the wife).  It was gnocchi with a red bell pepper sauce (ah, to die for).  Again, we had a great time catching up and just being on vacation.

I have surprised myself this week in my ability to avoid working much at all and enjoying myself.  Of course now that will make going back to work on Monday that much worse but oh well.  We have a few things planned for today so I will have to let you know how that goes.  Until then...

Thanks for reading my Random Thoughts.

Jon