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