It's happened. Call the media

At exactly 150 days, 8 hours and 12 minutes, it happened. The doorbell rang. It was not UPS. It was not FedEx. Too late for mail-lady. It was not the gutter salesman. Neighbors exists. Not only do they exist, I guess they party. At least once a year anyway. 150 days. Almost half a year. Half a year wondering what in the hell is wrong with this neighborhood, but 150 days, 8 hours and 13 minutes later, I had a party invite in my hand. Will the world continue to survive?

PS: Want to know what's sad? I only know their last name because they have wireless. SECURED wireless BTW, but savvy enough to name their wireless after themselves. Me? I'd name my wireless network "IMGONNASHOOTYOUALLANDMOVEBACKTOKANSAS" but the damn router wouldn't take it.

Ex-spukes me?

DISTURBING PICTURE WARNING!

My Abby. Poor girl. She chews so hard. She means so well. But sometimes you just have to swallow. It's not pleasant, but it's REQUIRED. And some things are not meant to be swallowed. Like knives for instance. She wasn't feeling well for days, and finally, the TRUTH came out. I wish I had taken a picture of what it was before, blue, fluffy, squeaky (oh, you can't take a picture of sound?), one of her favorites balls. It's gone now, I think she's OK although it took another day to make sure. Poor girl.





PS: Our carpet was white when we bought the house. JUST KIDDING!

Merry Christmas, Damnit.

I vow to get in the mood this year! Last year (the entire year, but mainly the holidays) sucked because we were moving. Has it been a year? Yes. T started her job on December 18th, while she was home for a week over Christmas, we skipped a lot of things, including a tree and lots of presents (had to have SOME!). This year is going to be different. And to get myself in the mood, I stole this from Shelly:

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Bags for most, but I do both.

2. Real tree or artificial? Fake. And after putting up with the fake tree made in O'Fallon MO for the past 20 years, we just bought a new 9 footer with built in lights.

3. When do you put up the tree? Supposed to be right after Thanksgiving, but we just did it a few days ago (12/09)

4. When do you take the tree down? Before New Years Eve

5. Do you like eggnog? You know, I do, but we don't have it much. Homemade is killer, and I'm looking forward to it this year (you do know it's made with raw eggs right?)

6. Favorite gift received as a child? A Radio Shack Electronics Kit, you could make all sorts of things, buzzers, radio, etc. I think it formed who I am.

7. Do you have a nativity scene? A what?

8. Hardest person to buy for? Hmmmm. My Dad is pretty tough.

9. Easiest person to buy for? When I get in the mode, my honey.

10. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? I don't want to be specific, but thoughtless gifts from certain relatives.

11. Mail or e-mail Christmas cards? Mail.

12. Favorite Christmas movie? A Christmas Story. You'll shoot yer EYE OUT!

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? I start early, procrastinate, then catch up 2 weeks before. Hey, that's today.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Hell ya.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Prime Rib, covered with salt, thyme and Farmland Cider House Bacon (sponsored by Pop-Tarts!), which I can't find here so hoping someone will overnight a few pounds.

16. Clear lights or colored on the tree? Colored and blinky! But Noooooooooooooo!

17. Favorite Christmas song? Carol of the bells. I sing bass, "Ding dong, ding dong"

18. Travel for Christmas or stay at home? Stay at home, always. Christmas Eve too.

19. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer? Doubtful. I won't even try. Can't name the dwarfs either.

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Star. Dog Toy. Beer can.

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? We had a tradition, we could open one present on Christmas Eve, and could not come downstairs the next morning until Pop was ready with the camera. And made coffee. I always thought the logic was so that it would keep us busy in the morning. Mom had to approve which present, and it seemed like it was often a book or puzzle. I still like that tradition and we carry it on. Stockings are done after breakfast dishes are cleaned up.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of year? Politics. Merry Christmas is not a political statement. Happy Holidays is fine, but Merry Christmas isn't offensive, and if you think it is, likely YOU are. I hate that you never hear a lot of the songs that have anything to do with God, they've literally disappeared. Or they CHANGE the fricking words! Some companies don't have Christmas off, they have a family day. Whatever. Ho-Ho-Ho is offensive? Take my word for it, Yahoo will have turkeys and crap on Thanksgiving day, but look at how sensitive they will be around the 25th. Will we get a "holiday tree"?

23. What I love most about Christmas? Spending time alone with my honey and pups, eating lots, watching TV and feeling like a family.

24. Do you sleep in on Christmas Day? Nope, never can.

25th: Favorite Christmas cookies: Swedish Creme wafers and Spritz. First one is a family recipe coming soon to a blog near you, the other is a butter cookie, HAS to be colored red & green and not overcooked. Mmmmmmm

First big snow in Reno!

Hill's Pet food Presents The Science Diet Three Dog Blog (partnered with Purina)

I'm *SO* FRICKIN' *sick* of advertising. Junk mail, sales calls, pop ups, SPAM, crap slapped on football players, NASCAR drivers, flyers stuck in my door, kids pushing cleaning products and candy. Hell, the other night a kid showed up at the front door with PAINTINGS! PAINTINGS!? Leave me the HELL alone! Go play Battleship! What sparked this? Well, I'm not so sure how the hell it's so frickin newsworthy, but in the past 24 hours I have heard no more than 3 times that the Reno/Tahoe Open is now the.... (ready?)

THE:

That's just GREAT! What the hell is wrong with companies? This is such a big turn off that I've now got a "who cares" attitude about them building here. Great, more advertising. How long will it be before our driver's licenses are sponsored by Kodak? Our water bills featuring "Brita Water Purification products". Little signs along the highway saying "The fresh air you're breathing thanks to a donation in part by Frebreeze".

I think it started with golf a long time ago, and just snowballed. I remember being annoying by the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic. In KC, they renamed Sandstone Amphitheatre to "The Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre". Think many people call it that?

"Hey Bob! I got tickets to see Rush at Sandstone, ya wanna go grab some chips & beer and go?"

"Hey Bob, I got tickets to see Rush on their new Atlantic Records Snakes & Arrows tour at The Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre, wanna go grab some chips by Frito's Quality food products, some Anheuser-Busch Incorporated beer made in St. Louis by skilled midget artisans and make a road trip in my Ford F-150 Eddie Bauer Custom Special edition Extended TL4?"

Yeah..... That's it.

Racing and golf have got to be the worst. I don't think the Indianapolis 500 is pwned yet, but I bet they're working on it. I mean, look at all this crap:

• Allstate 400
• The Red Bull GP
• Budweiser Shootout
• Gatorade Duel 1 (and 2)
• Auto Club 500
• UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400
• Kobalt Tools 500
• Food City 500
• Goody's Cool Orange 500
• Samsung 500
• Subway Fresh Fit 500
• Aaron's 499
• Crown Royal Presents The Jim Stewart 400 (by Depends Adult Diapers)
• Dodge Avenger 500
• Nextel Open
• Coca-Cola 600
• Autism Speaks 400 presented by Visa
• Citizens Bank 400
• Toyota/Save Mart 350
• Lenox Industrial Tools 300
• Pepsi 400
• USG Sheetrock 400 (cause everyone knows racing and sheet rock are LIKE THIS!)

I'm stopping, but the list goes on and on. Isn't it pathetic?

Have you Googled yourself?

I have. Not news to me, but maybe to you, the Silicon Valley Entrepreneurs Conference has been around for years. 15 years ago, Dan Schmidt gave me a flyer. Somewhere I still have it. I also am well aware that SVEC makes networking equipment, just check eBay.

But news to me:

Silicon Valley Engineering Council
Silicon Valley Engineers Club
Sequachee Valley Electric Cooperative
Shenandoah Valley Electric Cooperative
Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century
Space Vacuum Epitaxy Center
Synsmash Vortex Elite Crew
Sichuan Video Electronic CO
SeaDataNet Virtual Educational Centre
Spatial Vector ElectroCardiograph
Shree Vidyaniketan Engineering College
Sacramento Valley Education Committee
Sacramento Valley Environmental Water Caucus
Shenandoah Valley Emmaus Community
Scottish Vocational Education Council
Spatially Varying Exposure and Color
Surprise Valley Electrification Corp

That's right, that's right! Svec is COOLER than ever!

And you thought it just meant 'shoe maker'. HA!

My kind of story (Thanks to Unca Frank & Ant Judith)

I'm not going soft, but sometimes I like these heartwarming stories, and this one truly is amazing. Enjoy.

In 1986, Dan Harrison was on holiday in Kenya after graduating from Northwestern University. On a hike through the bush, he came across a young bull elephant standing with one leg raised in the air. The elephant seemed distressed, so Dan approached it very carefully. He got down on one knee and inspected the elephant's foot and found a large piece of wood deeply embedded in it. As carefully and as gently as he could, Dan worked the wood out with his hunting knife, after which the elephant gingerly put down its foot. The elephant turned to face the man, and with a rather curious look on its face, stared at him for several tense moments. Dan stood frozen, thinking of nothing else but being trampled. Eventually the elephant trumpeted loudly, turned, and walked away. Dan never forgot that elephant or the events of that day.

Twenty years later, Dan was walking through the Chicago Zoo with his teenaged son. As they approached the elephant enclosure, one of the creatures turned and walked over to near where Dan and his son Dan Jr. Were standing. The large bull elephant stared at Dan, lifted its front foot off the ground, and then put it down. The elephant did that several times then trumpeted loudly, all the while staring at the man.

Remembering the encounter in 1986, Dan couldn't help wondering if this was the same elephant. Dan summoned up his courage, climbed over the railing and made his way into the enclosure. He walked right up to the elephant and stared back in wonder. The elephant trumpeted again, rapped its trunk around one of Dan's legs and slammed him against the railing, killing him instantly.

Probably wasn't the same elephant.

Mixed Nuts

The Movie. What a disappointment.

Steve Martin is probably one of my idols, if someone were actually to ask me who my idols were and I was given a chance to think about it. He's brilliant. His early stand up comedy rolled me back in my teenage years. Later on, just more funny. Check out this. It seems like he was on Saturday night live forever, but really not a lot. He was just so damned funny it's memorable. His books, if you've not read them, are a quick read and a joy. Search for him on Amazon and you'll be amazed at what all he's been involved in. He's funny, he writes, he directs, he acts, he plays the banjo like a cat-outta-hell. Kinda funny he plays with "The Rock Bottom Remainders" which includes another coupla favorite authors, Stephen King, Greg Isle, Scott Turow, Matt Groening and Dave Barry amoung others. Read "Dear Amanda", cracks me UP! Who's Francisco? To hear him read this on books on tape is the best. And he's not young either, I bet a lot of people peg him in the 40s. Try 60s. Look here for when he was young messing with the Smother's Brothers.

But man does he make some bad movies. Or maybe my sense of humor is weak. I had my hopes up with all the stars in this gem. Madeline Kahn, Juliette Lewis, Rob Reiner, Adam Sandler, Rita Wilson, Garry Shandling, Steven Wright, and good old Parker Posey!! WHO? I even spotted Haley Joel Osment. But what crap. Bad acting, a story that went no where and I barely cracked a smile. Tracy went to bed Steve, TO BED! I rate this up with Napoleon Dynamite and Dude, Where's my Car. Sorry Steve. Love ya, hope ya haven't forgotten my number, but this sucked.

This will be the last letter I write to you.

Milestone?

This week seems like PROGRESS! I think it's mainly cause the last POD has been here, is now empty and now gone (*note), but all of a sudden feels like a big hurdle has been jumped over. All my STUFF is in one state! Add to that I've turned on Amazon and have started receiving orders, and I've started forming a game plan on listing things on eBay. I also moved my office out of the mudroom, which in hindsight felt so cold and temporary. Not really much to blog about, now looking forward to when it ALL feels like HOME.

* Didn't even hear them come and take it! Walked outside, it was GONE!

My neighbors are GREAT!

I'm just kidding, I wouldn't know, I've barely met any. Honestly, I've talked more to Jesús, the guy that cuts the grass across the street, than I have almost ALL my neighbors. There's always exceptions, the neighbor facing our backyard came over last night and tried to sell me on some travel agency pyramid/multi-level marketing crap. That killed 20 minutes.

It's made me start to wonder, is this normal? You know how you have some friends that always want to kiss on the cheek and it's just not you and feels awkward? The guy that always, ALWAYS shakes your hand? Maybe it's the thing here, maybe everyone around us is wondering why WE haven't come over, had an open house, whipped out the Welcome Mat. We must be cold-clammy-keep-to-ourselves weirdoes.

My gripe about mortgage companies

When I was "a kid", on my first house, I was annoyed that my mortgage was sold 3 or 4 times willy-nilly, but I wrote it off as me not having great credit at the time and being a first time mortgage owner. And I got over it and went on with life. When I bought my 2nd house, I went with local Cap Fed and had it set up with my accounts for autopay, never even considered that they'd sell it and they didn't. I like Cap Fed. Still do. Too bad it's only in the Midwest.

When you are looking, mortgage companies act like they're your best friend. What a crock. Just like a lot of industries, they just want your money, and the salespeople just want their commissions. We went with CTX, for no real good reason except on the advice of our realtor, but I won't use them again, and won't recommend them. Why? It's all "standard practices" and crap like that, but it gets so IMPERSONAL about something so important. Within a month or two, they sold off our 2nd mortgage to Countrywide. Did I have a say in this? No. Did someone call me up and go "Mr Svec? Get your wife on the phone will ya, we want to see if it's OK if we sell off your mortgage. No? Not OK. Oh, I understand, we won't do it then". Hell no. Not even close, just a letter saying it's been done. It happens all the time, your letter says so. Matter of fact it's "common practice". Well thanks a lot asswipes, now I have to:

1. Send in a 2nd payment in another envelope (that'll be about $50 in postage over the term of the 8 year loan)
2. Monitor a 2nd companies terms & timelines
3. Simply DEAL with TWO now. Now I'm on TWO mailing lists too, and already gotten tons of junk mail from both stupid companies wanting me to buy insurance and refinance.

And another gripe. Don't they want my money? Fricking CTX charges $20 to make an autopayment on their site. $20!!!! I'm doing all the damn work, why do they get MORE for it?!?!? So we send in a check.

But back to the transferring. They did it again. We're barely 6 months in to our loans and now CTX has sold the main one off to Chase. You know that's just great. Do *I* have a choice in this? Hell no. Can I do ANYTHING without paying a fee? Nope!! If I wanted to go with my local bank, I'd have to pay all sorts of costs, appraisal, closing, blah blah. Absolutely not fair. The letter says "This is a common practice in the mortgage industry and has no effects on the terms & conditions". Yeah, while that may be true, it's impersonal and aggravating. This is October 17th and it's affective with my Nov 1st payment. What if I was out of town? What if I had it auto-paid through MY bank (not CTX)? What if I had already sent it? HUH? HUH?

It's common practice to spit your used gum out the window, but that doesn't make it right.

It's common practice to leave a Mexican restaurant as quickly as possible if you've overflown the toilet, but that doesn't make it right.

Frankly, it just pisses me off. They do it for one reason, and one reason only, so they can make money.

Just feelin' GOOD!

I probably have a thousand mini movies of my pups. Finding old ones brings back memories. Almost to the day, this was 5 years ago just months before Roscoe went to the world of endless treats and tennis balls, our October 2002 trip to take him to the ocean. OK, OK, we went and saw my aunt & uncle in PA for the first time in 10 years too, and saw another aunt & uncle in Annapolis, and went to DC, and picked up a pinball machine along the way, and stayed at some B&Bs, and visited Tracy's brother. But the main IDEA of the trip was to take my boy to see the ocean. Amber liked the water better, but he was happy, and that was my goal in life at the time. Good boy.

How do I run in to the weirdoes?

I'm an eBay Trading Assistant. All that means is I flagged myself on eBay and wrote up a little paragraph on how I can help YOU (you computer illiterate weasel) sell your stuff. For a fee. I always thought it was a bit ironic, first off, to find me, you have to have a computer. Second, you have to be smart enough to look on eBay for a TA. I guess there are plenty of people still that just can't handle it, as evident by some of the people that contact me.

About three weeks ago, I got an email: "i have equestrian equipment, 1st ed signed books and custom clothes. please contact", and so I did. I first checked to make sure I had changed my locale to NV, and I had but didn't want to waste anyone's time if they thought I was still in KC. I asked where they were located, again not wanting to drive 45 minutes south for junk, and got a reply: "4th street near 395. can you do this?". Sure I can, and I let them know I'd like to meet, see what they have, etc and go from there.

I had done this a few times in KC and from experience, know that the majority of STUFF they want to sell is not worth much. One guy brought me about 10 things to "try out", half did not sell, the other half only got $10-$20. Another guy had a lot of decent books, videos and CDs, which are easy to list and sell on Amazon, so I take those when I get them. Again we're talking small dollars here, but the books & vids take very little time to list and ship, and once in awhile you get a gold nugget. I also worked my butt off on taking pics, wording and and prepping to list a pop-up camper, but the dude thought it was worth way more then I researched, and realized that if I sold it, I'd be taking a cut (which I lowered from my other stuff, but still money he wouldn't see). He changed his mind after the work I did and sold it on his own. Think he'll get his old crappy books back I never listed? Nah.

Anyway! Asking for a phone number and address for this new guy got some strange replies: "I really do not have a phone number right now. In all actuality, the sooner this could happen - the better...so if Sunday might work? I know these things take time (and no... lol this stuff isnt hot) still, I'm at the Sandman Motel at 1755 E. 4th"

Hot? Who said anything about being hot? Why would you bring THAT up? And Hotel? OK, getting a little weird. Without replying, I get another email: "I vacated my last apt due to an illness and now Im selling the last of my stuff before I head out to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota next week. That simple. Its not weird or stolen and if you want, I can have this verified by the Reno PD."

Now I'm curious, but also a heckuva lot more hesitant on doing anything. To see how serious this dude is, I ask for pictures. Response? "im not giving out anymore inventory lists or pics due to three other ebay sellers jerking me around and then asking wayyyyyyy too many questions. i know what i need and as an ebay seller, i respect your business process. a visit to see this stuff would be worth your time. say tuesday afternoon? sorry about it, but ive been burned too many times in reno already. if no, i appreciate your time in advance. peace "

Uh huh. I'm not sure how sending pics could transpire in to jerking him around, and not sure what business processes of mine he respects, but I kindly told him I didn't' want to waste my time on junk, and if he had pics and could send them, I'd consider a visit. I also made it very clear that anything I was going to sell, I'd take with me, and I'd bring a simple contract so he would feel more comfortable about me taking his stuff. And then he DID send pictures (has a digital camera too eh?). It was horse stuff for sure, and looked like some of it would sell OK.

One of the last two emails I got from him increased my uneasiness: "i dont know if this will work but Sir.. i you knew what was going on in my lie then you would understand. it's not weird... sounds sketchy i know; but if you fear this transaction ask a police officer to accompany you. i'm doing my best with the tools i have... God has done this for me for a reason; and yes with a receipt of you taking the items then i would trust you. otheriwse the items get thrown away and destroyed and thats money gone for you and i. please... work with me. "

I don't know what ever happened, because I never heard from him again. We set a date for Tuesday, but having no way to contact him, I sent one email asking how and didn't bother following up when I didn't hear back. I'm sure he truly has issues and if serious, I feel for him.

Snow?

(Totally forgot to post this and now it's been a coupla weeks.)

A coupla days after we had snow in the mountains, it was a late Friday night, chilly and about 11PM I walked out to....

SNOW!

OK, not a lot of snow, and not even sticking anywhere on the ground, but still SNOW! It was just 90 degrees out, and I JUST mowed the front yard that same day. What kinda weird-ass whacky place is this!

My Favorite COPS quotes

I have never been able to pinpoint exactly why I like watching shows like COPS, America's Most Wanted, Most Amazing, Judge Judy, Jerry, etc etc. It has something to do with observing how STUPID people are I think. COPS plays quite often on Court TV, so much so that in a few days, I better watch my TIVO or I'm gonna run out of space. It's good background noise too, if I'm in there cooking, it's an easy show to listen too while I work. I know she won't admit it, but Tracy likes it a bit too, especially the 1 minute clips of the truly memorable moments, such as:

• Put it in da paper! Put it in da paper!!
• What did I did?

I love the blank, dumb, I'm So Innocent look on some perps faces, very bad actors in most cases. More of my favorite quotes & moments:

• I wuz scared (always in response to "Why were you running?"
• That's not mine! (Mary Jane in the wallet, crack pipe, gun, etc)
• I'm not gonna lie to you (or) Why would I lie?
• I don't have nuthin' on me. (it's in the bushes where I threw it)
• "So you haven't been smoking any weed?"... "No, why would you say that?" (Guy has a joint behind his ear in plain sight. Whoops! Forgot! Silly me!
• And one of my favorite action adventures was when this idiot had about 20 police cars behind him, as if he's going to get away! Happens to be in Kansas City:

More weather talk....

It's as weird as KC, but different. Yesterday it hit mid 70s, today 80 and this is what I can see from my back yard, best to enlarge it:

Yeah, that's snow in the mountains. SNOW! Officially it was there on the last day of summer, can you believe it? The pups love snow about as much as they love the water, and I can't wait for true winter weather to arrive. Biggest bummer is I don't have a wood burning fireplace, but I'll survive. The gas one puts out a nice ambiance, and maybe as I get older I'll realize what I was doing was a LOT of work. Satisfying work though.

Weird weather

All of a sudden the weather here is reminding me of Kansas.

Don't like it? Wait a minute!

A week or so ago it was in the 90s near every day and it had been hot since the day I got here. The other day about 9PM I opened the door and WTF? It's RAINING? Tracy gets a little excited and tells me to grab the cooler and put it under the eave to catch the water. Sure enough, it filled it half way full (water for the garden, filthy too. All that dirt running off the roof). The next day it's still cloudy and I hear something about chains required at elevations above 7000 feet, that's Lake Tahoe. Already??? We went from 90 to snow in a week? Sheesh. And I guess it's true, while it reached mid 70s yesterday and is already 60 here and it's still mid morning, I've heard of 6" to a foot of snow in the "Sierras". Absolutely weird. The lows every day for the next week are upper 30s, highs in the mid 70s. Great sleeping weather, but doubt we'll be taking the dogs swimming soon.


Last weekend:
Oh look! A Chicken!

Throw the ball, will ya dad?

Drying out:

My helicoptor is bigger than your helicopter, NYAH NYAH

I wasn't going to bitch about this, cause I've been accused of being fairly negative and bitchy, but I am what I am so I'm GONNA! Let me start by saying I've found that overall the people here in Reno/Sparks are pretty friendly and helpful. I've got more than one story about people going out of their way to help, suggest, advise or just discuss something with me unexpectedly. The earliest example is when I was still in KC and Tracy was wanting to hire someone to do our yardwork cause she was working so much. I emailed a friendly person that had come to look at our playground, asking if she knew of any neighborhood dudes that cut lawns. Guess what? She did it for us! She hauled over her mower MORE than once and cut our lawn, fer nuthin'!! And after that, allowed Tracy to come borrow her lawn mower too! What a nice gesture. (I still need to meet her.)

But not this dude. A few weekend's ago we were exploring, going up & down the Truckee River looking for dog swimming areas. Out by Verdi (Ver DIE) we came across a little subdivision right along the river, which happened to be having a neighborhood garage sale too. It was Sunday, so not many participating, but we still managed to hit a few. On the way out, an old GEEZER was at the end of his driveway and had a large gas powered helicopter on a stand that he was about to put away. Could he be selling? Could he be closing up his garage sale? Nah, I doubt it. Those things are expensive and this looked like a big one. But what the heck, it's a neighborhood garage sale, right? Beautiful day, sunny, blue skies, nice driving weather.... I roll up and roll down the window and:

That thing for sale??
(Grumpy look on his face) You couldn't afford it sonny.
(Me, a bit smart alecky) Now, how do you know how much money I have in my pocket?
(Almost angry look!) Do you know how much this costs? This is over $20,000 and is worth more than your car. To give you an example (of what I don't know) I own a Boeing Bell Blah T-206, costs me 1.5 million.

Goodie for you scooter. Take some of your money and buy a personality. I'm not even sure how the conversation ended, but we didn't talk much more and I drove away. What an ass. It struck a little nerve, and probably always will when people PRESUME things about you, your lifestyle and your financial situation. I've lived with that a lot, especially since I've gone self employed, which to many means "doesn't work". For all he knew, I was a bulti-zillionaire. It's the same thing to hear how "lucky" you are, let's ignore the hard work we've done, we're "lucky"!!

Lucky I tell you!

I want to (HIC!) ride my bicycle (HIC!)

I simply HAD to do it. Had to!!!

Butta, WHAT ARE THEY THINKING!???!!?

I'm sorry, but WHAT THE HELL?!?!

They changed the size of BUTTER?

Or is this a West coast thing? Did they get Bill Gates in on it? You know, make a change that EVERYONE will have to conform to even though it doesn't make it better? Did they take a survey? Do studies? Testing? Gave a rats ass about all the BUTTER DISHES out there? IT DON'T FIT my DISH MAN!!!!! You know, they still sell hot dogs in a 10 pack, and buns in an 8. They can't fix that but some f-ing genius has convinced the butter patrol to revamp the size of sticks. Help me man, what am I missing?!?!?!?!?!

I **HATE** People Who Steal! YA THIEF!!!!

Or people that thing they have a "right", or think they are better than others and show it. Talk about balls!! I finally got this little situation resolved thanks to my buddy Pete. I found out about it about three weeks ago, and being 1500 miles away, it's tough to be DO anything about it:

Here is my garden in 2005. Nice huh? Blow up the picture, look at that sunflower, those luscious tom plants, the windmill. Nice huh?

Now two years later, after I've left but before I've sold my house. Here's another pic. Blow it up, whatta ya see? To clue you in, that's my NEIGHBOR'S yard, with *MY* WINDMILL!!!

Look closer, oh I'll do it for you, look below. That's my wagon. Home made for the most part and I forgot it, and Suzie was supposed to go get it out of my garden but had forgotten.

So yeah, my lovely next door neighbor BRENDA figured since I was gone, she'd help herself! Windmill, wagon, and I've also heard of a few other things that frankly were trash to me, but she JUST HELPED HERSELF! No call, no email, no nothing. Just went over and STOLE them. That's stealing, and trespassing, but mostly FRICKING RUDE! Thanks to Pete, they are in my garage now, I've got a home for the windmill, and the wagon will somehow find it's way home.

SHEESH!

Labor Day River plunge

Man my pups sure love the water. We scouted around a little bit and found a nice access area to the Truckee River just West of downtown Reno. Sure does tire them out too!

Ready?

Cruise Dog Missile
Three very happy dogs

Action movie!

Boo tired

Stones tired

Abbytail queen of the bed

Better than Tampax

That special time of the month deserves a special outfit. This actually worked VERY well. What else could you do? She's about a year old, I think.

Rain?

Wow, all my griping must have pissed off the rain gods, we got sprinkled on today

QUICK, GRAB THE CAMERA BEFORE IT DRIES UP! <<>>

No wine cellar, so whatta ya do?

Well, we bought this wine rack. Now honestly, whatta ya do in a house that has no cool basement? From the picture, it looks kinda white trash to have it in the hallway (off the kitchen), but it really kinda works well! The garage was off cause of heat, and the laundry room suspect. Tracy didn't want it in the living room, and where else can you put it? Bathroom?

Also reality hit me as I'm unpacking my third huge box of wine & box: I'm a Pack Rat!!! I've still got a full case + 1 of a 1983 McDowell Valley Cab Sav that I first had at Houston's in KC, I wonder if it's any good. I also ran across a nice Turley, some T-Vine and a flurry of other good ones. Probably a lot of BAD ones in there too. (Aside from the obvious of throwing it away, what can you do with old vine? How about making your own balsamic? That would be interesting). Back to being a pack rat, I counted. I've got exactly 100 bottles of wine. ONE HUNDRED! 93 on the shelf, 3 opened and 4 in the fridge. I'm half thinking I've got another box somewhere too, that's scary. And there I am at Trader Joe's today looking new ones over. BAD TODD!

Note to Butch: Your row is to the right of Keystone, we've still not sampled, it's coming.

Siren Day!!

Looks like Blogger is allowing movies now, this could be dangerous. This is one of my favorites. Every month in Kansas they tested the tornado sirens. They actually liked it!

OMG, Call out the National Guard!

Sirens wailing, people running for cover, small children hiding under desks!!!

IT LOOKS LIKE RAIN!

For the record, not a drop. I wuz really really a-skard though...

Weather: A BORING experience

Today the news said we hit day 80 of not having any measurable precipitation, and even that was 500ths of an inch. They said the last significant amount was in May, in the form of snow. Every day seems the same, with slight fluctuations on the temp, but nearly always sunny and hot. It most bore the bejeesuz out of the weathermen, can you tell? They gotta get creative. These is my actual EXCITING forecast:

F: Record breaking temperatures
S: Record breaking temperatures
S: Sunshine
M: A full day of sunshine
T: Plenty of sunshine
W: Sunny (guess SOMEONE wasn't in the SPIRIT NOW!)
T: Plenty of sunshine
F: Record breaking temperatures
S: Record breaking temperatures (Can you tell the weekend guy is working?)
S: Record breaking temperatures
M: Record breaking temperatures
T: Hot with sunshine
W: Sunny and very warm
T: Hot in the morning, sunshine (or sunshine in the morning, hot)
F: Sunny and hot (please kill me!)

A few weeks ago there was a 30% chance of maybe getting a brief downpour. *MUCH* excitement!! They so happened to have finally caught Bin Laden that day, dressed like Al Gore working at a Taco Bell, but this was BIG NEWS! Needless to say, we got nothing.

Weeds: A different experience

Some things you just don't think will be different when you move. Sure, the weather and cost of living come to mind, but did you ever give a thought about weeds? SURE! In KC, MOST of the yard was weeds (were weeds?), but here, it's different. The front lawn is pretty nice, but there's been about 3 types of little bastards that pop up and Mama, ya gotta use the gloves. I don't know what they are called but they got stickers. And they hurt. They are a pain in the ass. I've picked a name and am calling them "Bernies". They stick ya and they're a pain in the ass. Yeah. (See Note)

I'm not sure you can see the little barbs in this pic:

Secondly, what's a tumbleweed? Well, I'll tell ya. It's this large prickly weed that grows quick, dries up quick and get more brittle and more spiky. And they blow around and scratch cars, never thought of THAT have ya? Here's one I yanked up from the back yard (with gloves) and a dried one blowing around.



Guess how else they annoy ya? Well, last night unknown to us, one had stuck to Keystone's tail and leg, and as he walked around the house and laid down, pieces of it broke off, AND THE GREAT NEWS? THE GREAT NEWS?

They're the SAME COLOR AS THE CARPET!!!

So how do you find them, well, you STEP on them. Oh yeah, it was a fun evening. Peachy. Vaccuummiinngg them up helps, but it isn't perfect, they stick in the carpet too.

Sample piece:

Did I mention they get large? Think typical tumbleweed in a movie, you got the picture. And for a real picture, here's the neighbor's trash can today, one big weed:

(Note) To be accurate the Bernie weed would have to lie, drink all your beer and owe you money.

Me so funny

Wasn't sure where I was going with this, had this "draft" in my folder from four months ago,and well, what the heck, a fun pic!

Before & After: No playground! Yeah!

Having no kids (to speak of), buying a house with a playground was nothing but an eyesore for us. It was the first thing I listed on eBay when I got here, and I'm happy to say we got $660 bucks for it. We plan on eventually filling in the areas within the tree line with grass, but meanwhile, don't you think the view looks a LOT better? Oh, and we got a fence too, thanks to the neighbors up the hill!

Notice the shovel? That's for scooping up the cat shit that was in the sandbox. Disgusting. Also has greened up a lot in a few months eh?

Quiet neighborhood

This past weekend was fairly decent out, and T and I had scheduled some outdoor yard activities including weeding, mowing, trimming, and misc cleanup out back. While we do have two nice patches of grass out front, it isn't huge and not half what I had in KC. Regardless, I couldn't believe how many weeds had snuck in there! Weird weeds, not KC style at all, and most everything requires gloves or you'll get poked. Tracy hasn't mowed since before she left to come to get me, so it's been nearly 2 months since anything was done, but you wouldn't have thought it. The mower, lowered one notch, barely bagged half full! Guess I didn't need to bring all this power equipment with me, eh?

Pics of left and right of our front yard:

She's done some wonders with flowers & stuff there too. To the left and right of the entryway:

Notice anything Paul?

And still, another weekend goes by and no (barely any) neighbor activity. I did make a point to climb the hill in the backyard and introduce myself and shoot the shit with "Rod", who of course said "Oh, we were going to come down today and meet ya today". Sure ya were. Seemed nice, gave me some pointers on some yard stuff & got some neighborhood gossip.

Pics of the before and after monkey playground coming soon!!!

Call me a grump

Almost a month here in dry hot Nevada, and I still don't know what to think. I woke up this morning realizing most of what I did yesterday put me in a lousy mood, and it kinda carried over to today. In most respects it's all cause I'm 1500 miles away from my home and friends, or something related in only ways I can figure out. I quickly realized even before I left that though much of my communications in the past with friends was phone, email or chat, some wrote me off months before I left, as if these forms of communication are no good anymore, even though nothing's changed except my physical location. On the other hand, there's a few that it seems like I'm still there. We chat, talk. You get the idea. I've made some attempts to meet pinball people here, and actually have had someone over, but I feel like I'm grasping. And being a self-employed bum in an upper scale neighborhood with no kids to speak of makes it worse. It's VERY quiet on my block from sun up to sun down. It seems as if people are working, then they come home and hole up inside. I thought maybe in a month's time we'd have a heckuva lot more interaction with neighbors, but literally no one's come by. The doorbell has rang only a few times not counting gutter salesmen, UPS and FedEx. To be honest, I can think of once, the lady next door brought over a plant for Tracy to put in the ground, something they apparently had talked about before. People pay for landscaping, pay for mowing, and aren't sitting outside whooping it up. I've smelled one grill, and with Da Nose figured out it was immediately next door, but that's been once. I'm really not one to want to socialize all the time, but sheesh, this is driving me a bit nuts! Tracy works 10 hour days, which means she leaves by 7 and is home about 6 or later. The dogs like it, but they've requested more excursions. I *hate* having a garage stacked to the rafters with boxes of junk. The trash people are assholes. The electric bill was $325. I don't have a big room for pinballs. I miss my garden. The KC house inspection came back with TOO many things that annoyed me (the lot is flat, that could cause problems!).

Man am I grumpy today. It's barely 9AM, I better get out of it.

Moving sucks

I know I'll have more stories later, but tonight a shorty, cause I'm wide awake after a mere 5 hours sleep, up since 5:30AM and it's near midnight (again), a little wired, tired but alert, feeling old and stressed.

So I thought I was pretty well prepared, but not. Just in 24 hours:

• I've got a half roll of TP. I didn't think about grabbing more. Good thing I have some at the Shoppe!


• I woke up at what time? I dunno, they packed my clock radio. Can't fall asleep to the radio either.


• No dishes and silverware suck more than I expected. Last night I needed a water glass. I rinsed out a Keystone can and used it instead. This morning, I had nothing to spread butter with, and besides it was hard, so I ate dry toast. I had kept aside a coffee mug so I could M-Wave the two cups I got at QT when it got cold, but they packed it. I guess.


• Last night I went out with Kevin & Suzie to Salsa grill, but tonight since I was drinking beer, I didn't want to drive to get food, so I ate.... 10 packages of "Bite Size" peanut butter mini Ritz sammich crackers and enough pickled beets to turn my fingers pink.


• I've been packing crap tonight, throwing away a lot.....guess I should have held back some trash bags. Sigh.


• I'm so smart! I set aside 4 days worth of clothes and put them upstairs on the railing. Of course when I went up there today, they were gone. My fault. I told them to pack everything except the north office, and where did I leave them?


• So I took a shower, but did I leave a towel? NO! Thank God I left (and they left) a washcloth, which was dry so it got an early promotion!


• Headache - need aspirin - call neighbor. Trash bags, call neighbor. ZIPLOC bags, call neighbor. <--- Ironic, they packed two of my cordless phones, which will soon be beeping Lo-Batt. Ha. What's in dat box beepin' boss?

I've been packing my office tonight and when I've found disks, I've checked them for old pictures. Been very nice and kinda fun to find old pictures. I found this one today, a series of about 6 that I took over 8 years ago before we were even married. It made my day. I'm nicknaming it "smolder" (hee!) and I dunno about you, but I read a LOT in to her eyes in this picture, and it makes me remember tons of things about her and why I love her so much.

Maybe I'm incapable of a SHORT blog?

Because I SAID so! Those are the rules. That's the policy. (What-Ever...)

I can't say I hate authority, I'm OK with it, really am. What I don't like is things supposedly set in stone when you know they aren't. The phrase "That's the best we can do" comes to mind. I do a lot of haggling and bargaining and have my rules in my head. Don't offer less for something unless you're willing to let it go. Don't low ball on every damn thing. It's OK to say NO to someone that is an ass, or even isn't. You don't have to do something just cause someone else says so either, whatever THAT may be at the moment. Garage sales bring out a lot of the best in people, and I'm not afraid to offer $10 on something someone has $15 on, but there are limits, and garage sale etiquette, just like everything else. (Huh, I've drifted in to garage sale stories. I'm gonna write that book, I swear). I've actually been to a sale or two where signs are posted "All prices firm". Kinda not the spirit of things, but I guess you have your reasons! A coupla stories about bad hagglers:

Story 1: Background: When I did a big company move years ago, they abandoned a ton of power strips, some really nice surge protector ones, some generic strips. I bet I had 8 boxes of them. I still have a bunch of them, gave a lot away to friends, and sold a bunch at my garage sales. I'd get a box out, slap $3 on each of them and put them all around. Some here, some on this table, some over there. People snapped them up, I bet I sold 30 or more over various sales. If people were looking them over, I'd help. That one's got a long cord, that one is a surge protector, that one is arranged such that those power bricks fit well, etc etc. I'm a nice guy, I'm helping! $3.00 each is a good deal, it's not the deal of the century ($2.00 would be), but the price is right. So, in the middle of the sale on the first day, 10 strips already sold, some lady comes up with two of them and ***BAD HAGGLE ALERT*** "Woodja take $1 each if I buy two?". Mentally I say many things, but I nicely say "Well... Nah, I'm selling them fine for $3 each... it's a good deal. I'll knock off a buck for two" to have her promptly set them down, turn and walk away. Bye bye unhappy lady!!!

Story 2: Tools. Some men HAVE to one-up you, and then tell you about it. I have a box of tools, misc, $1.00 each. Old man who I recognize from other sales comes up with one screwdriver and says "Would you take a quarter". OK, well, I've seen you before and whatever, this time I'll just take his damn quarter. "Sure". He proceeds to dig in to his pocket and amongst the quarters, hands me 5 pennies, 2 nickles and a dime. Mini bad form there grandpa, you said QUARTER. I zip it. So as he's counting out the change ***BAD HAGGLE ALERT*** he says kinda slowly "Now.... you wanna know why I zeroed in on THIS particular screwdriver?". Sure I say. "Cause it's a HUSKY!"

....And your point is?

"Lifetime warranty! See that nick? (points to a little chip in the tip) I'm gonna take it back to Home Depot and they've give me a brand new one still in the package and I'll put it on eBay for five dollars!" Faster than you could say jack-rabbit, I had him wrestled to the ground retrieved my screwdriver and stabbed in the eye. Not really.

So this leads me to why I really wanted to gripe about. The dreaded notorious Department of Motor Vehicles. Weeks ago I turned in the plates for two vehicles I had sold. Unknown to me, not only do you need the plates, but you are supposed to bring in your registration receipt. I did not, and after waiting for half an hour, just paid the outrageous $2 fee (one per printout) so the lady could click two buttons and print out the info she already has in her computer. Why? I don't know, to file or shred it are the only two outcomes I see. I don't argue, I guess I'm in a good mood. And after being told a check would be coming my way, I left. Now on to the third vehicle, the Toyota I drove to Nevada, the one that Tracy has NV plates on, and she has her NV driver's license, and she brought me back the KS plate so I can turn it in. Yeah, this is me, wanting to save a buck, she forgot the registration, so I had her fax it to me. After waiting for 45 minutes, more than 15 minutes past the wait time the clock says, I'm finally called. I saw other people come in before me that have already left, but no Refund people. A little annoyed, I walk to the counter.

Hi (handing over the plate and the registration)
I'm going to need a Drivers license
(Aren't you a joy! I hand it over)
This is a fax, I'm going to need an original or have to have a dollar to print one out.
You gotta be kidding me. What difference does it make??
It's got to be an original.
If you print one out, that's not the original.
Those are the rules sir.
Well, I think that's a bunch of crap. The info is right there and isn't any different.
You can fill out a comment card.
I will. (So I whip out my dollar and hand it over. It lays there for a second then she takes it. Then she takes my worthless, no good, not adequate enough fax and lays it above her keyboard and starts typing from it!)
Uh... No.... (I reach over and take it) If my fax isn't good enough, you can't use it! (Now I've flustered her)
I was just getting the number
Go print it. You charge me a dollar when I took the time to have the info faxed to me and it's a stupid policy.
She clicks to print and leaves to go get it. I calm a bit. She comes back
You know I'm not upset with you, it's just a stupid policy and I took the time to have my wife fax it from Nevada just so I'd have all the info.
She's silent.... Now did you sell the car?
No, it's now in Nevada with Nevada tags, my wife moved there and sent the old tags back
You can't do that, she's going to have to come in with her Nevada ID and registration.
You've GOT to be kidding me. She's there, I'm here. I've not moved yet. I still own the vehicle. You've GOT to be kidding. You expect her to fly here for a $100 refund?
I'll go talk to my manager.
(You do that)
The story is kinda anticlimactic. She came back and told me to have Tracy fax her NV registration and drivers license to her and she'd process. I got lucky in getting a hold of Tracy quickly and after only waiting for her to finish up the next guy in line, I got my paperwork done and was out of there, $95 promised check in the mail, an hour of my life I'll never reclaim. Funny to me that faxes were OK.

I told her to have a nice day, she didn't acknowledge. Grump.

Let's take the dog for a drag

One thing I'm going to miss about my hood and the whole city is the very unique *things* I've encountered over the years. One is this bulldog (I think it's a bulldog). The owners walk him frequently, and every time, it's the dog hanging on to the leash, in a pretty unique manner, and the owners putting up with it. I swear that most often the dog is leading the way, but yesterday, I snapped this pic. She's very pregnant, and Buster (I made that up), isn't cooperating. Makes me laugh!!

Spam again... Oh come on, LAUGH!

-----------------------
We promise that after trying Penis Enlarge Patch you dick wont look like overly boiled sausage.

You think that nature was unfair to your penis? Change the nature with Penis Enlarge Patch.

-----------------------

Yes... change the nature. Now honestly, someone thought this would draw customers?

Spam

I hate spam and junk mail, but sometimes it makes you laugh on how BAD it is. The solicitations for business, even if it's legit, is this someone I want to send money to? (Slightly editted to remove pure junk and sentences split up cause it amuses me. Nothing deleted)

Enjoy!

_______________________

Via eBay: Question for eBay Trading Assistant

Dear toddsvec,We are Chinese wholesale dealers.

If you have no good source but become sad.We can help you, please collect us, we can be long-term to provide you with low price, bringing you larger success.

We have a great deal of goods, the need is big of long-term of cooperation colleague.

Our wholesale category contain 4000.

The sample order.

Have great capacity can there is big special discount.

Please contact us.

The good opportunity isn't every day to have, we believe you will try.

The cooperation is a delectation.

The following is we the contact method of the integrity: Website:www.XXXXXX.com MSN:XXXXX@hotmail.com

The following is the space of the free order shoe: www.XXXXX.whatever

best wishes your sincerely

Thank you, www.ZZZZZ.com

_______________________

I mean really. The free order shoe? You had me 'til the free order shoe.

I just might screw with them.....

"Holy crap, really? Free shoes? That's certaily a delectation!!!!!! Can you bring me larger success if I do small of short-term coopertion quasi-banana?

Anxious a bently.

Sam Sneed, Keystone connosewer."

Parking Idiots part 2

One thing I'm going to miss a lot is my little store. I like to call it "The Shoppe", which, if you don't know, helps me differentiate it from "Storage", which is Glenn's building, and "the store", which is where we keep canned good and other crap in my basement, really an old fruit cellar. The Shoppe is great, been perfect for storing my books & software, and it's been a great showroom for my pinballs and video games. There's room for 20 machines, which is a bit cramped, and even now I've got 14 there, but this Friday many will be picked up and on their way. SIGH.

ANYWAY, one thing I won't miss, at all, is the idiots that work next door at the pizza place. I've bitched how they can't park between lines, and over the past year there's been other things that they can't do (must be job requirements), like if the trash guys don't put the dumpster back around the corner, it's CERTAINLY not the pizza guys job to move it, NO WAY! That would be in the category of NMJ. More than once I've arrived and the dumpster is practically in front of my door. I know it's not their fault, but since they use it a LOT daily, filling it every 2-3 days, is it asking too much to push it back in place? Apparently so.

As a whole though, it's the parking. I've been there for 16 months+ now, they know I'm there (hell, I walk in to pay rent!) and not like they don't know I come in all the time, often on odd hours. Parking space is limited and it's not rocket science to park without being an ass and taking up 2 or 3 slots. So I do in on Sunday afternoon, what do I see? Just look below.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!

Frankly, I just love my dogs....

Not a lot of talk today, just some fun pics I've taken over the years..