SOMEBODY Needs to Clean This Up!!!

Here are a few of the pictures my dad came back with from his week of volunteering in New Orleans



The interior shot shows the high water mark




In case you don't know, you can click on the pictures to enlarge them





This is the barge that took out a portion of the levee











Yes, that is really the color of the water in the pool!!! These pictures were taken just a couple weeks ago. It doesn't look like a whole lot has been done yet. My dad loaned me a disc with pictures from 5 of his fellow volunteers, almost 800 shots.

It doesn't look like a whole lot has been done yet, does it???

Interesting Choice of Words

There was an article in the paper today about Steve Kubby, an attorney jailed for medical marijuana. He has adrenal cancer. The part of the article that caught my attention, however, was about the doctors, who they had as stating (I'm not making this up) that "the marijuana helps BLUNT the lethal illness"

More Thoughts on Ghosts

In my previous post I alluded to ghosts in the title, and Lilly picked up on some presence lingering in her comment. I don't know if that is the case, I've never seen anything to make me think so. But, my mom did have a younger brother who died as a child. I'm pretty sure it wasn't in the house, but could be something to it... My wife has seen some things, but, you know, she's insane. She says she's not anymore, but I've never seen a certificate of sanity with her name on it. Anyway, I detect no malevolent spirits.

Actually, I take that back about not having seen anything to hint at a lingering presence... Now that I think about it, there was an unusual series of dreams and events one night. Let me preface this by saying I rarely remember any of my dreams.

I was in bed dreaming that someone had broken in and stolen my TV and left the front door hanging open. I awoke around 11:30 PM after that, woken up by some kind of noise and headed out to the front room. A couple of teens were running down the street, knocking over trash cans. OK, a little out of the ordinary but by no means supernatural. Back to bed. A few hours later I awoke again, and that dream was still in my head. I came out to the front room again, and this time the TV was turned on, but there was nothing but static on it. Reminded me of that scene from Poltergeist where the TV people come!!! Now that was weird!!!

Lingering Ghosts

Now this tripped me out. Recently my youngest child has begun calling his big brother "pink head". I have no idea where he came up with this or what it's supposed to mean, but it really infuriates him!!! Probably the main reason he continues to call him that.

Today we were visiting with my parents, and for some reason this came up. My mom (who was raised in the house where we now live) was somewhat surprised, and told us "I used to call my big sister the same thing!!!" Wild, huh???

Death Around the Corner

Here's another story from my past, along a similar line as my story of my memories of 2002. Like that story, its not something that I normally go around telling people about, but its in there...

Twelve years ago today was when it happened. It was a Friday, and I was looking forward to the weekend, as well as a leisurely work day. I rolled into work probably 10 minutes or so before starting time. They were running an early shift for production starting at 5 AM, so the machines were already up and running. I sat down at the table in the break area to wait until the starting bell rang. I slid back in my chair, and relaxed until it was time to start.

Unlike where I'm working now, this place has relatively few employees, and I was good friends with several of them. Scott and Shelley I had first met when Shelley was pregnant with their son when I started working there in 1998. They weren't married, but might as well have been. Common law married. I had been to many of their son's birthdays and barbecues at their residences. They ended up living in a hotel for a while for standing up to a slum lord apartment manager. Scott was a Viet Nam veteran who had joined up to be in the airborne division, jumping out of planes. Unfortunately, he never got to do that, just as he got out of boot camp we began pulling out, and he was on that detail instead. I could go on about some of the antics we had gotten into, and perhaps at some point I will.

They got out of the hotel and were renting a nice house when Shelley's aids infected brother and his lover lost their place and ended up moving in with them. Their place was nice for a single family with one or two children, but it got crowded with them along. There was some tension brought on by that situation, and Shelley kicked Scott's ass out. He ended up moving in with his father, another good friend of mine who also worked with us. Scott often had lunch with a small group of four of five of us, and always had colorful observations or stories to share. The topic that was most often discussed that week was how he was going to begin courting Shelley anew, starting that evening when he had plans to take her out for a nice dinner. He had gotten his hair cut, much shorter than usual, and it looked a little strange seeing him like that.

Scott came in with his dad that morning, and went to his area and sat back in his chair and pulled his hat down over his eyes to rest a bit until the bell rang. Shelley had some errand that she was off doing that morning, so she wasn't there. Sal, another of the workers there showed up. I wasn't as close with him, even though we did partake in some of our filthy habits together on occasion, along with another of my friends, Pokes. Sal was a wannabe gangsta, always with a bandana pulled low on his forehead. He got there just a couple of minutes before the bell rang.

I was still reclined at the table, and was half dozing when I heard a sharp bang, sounded like someone had flat-dropped a pallet, and that's what I thought it was. I was startled awake by the racket and shot a nasty look towards the production area, then turned back to the table and was starting to relax again. Just then I heard Sal begin to shout to call 911, Scott had been shot. I ran into the office and called, not knowing any details. Unlike the time I ended up calling them in 2002, they picked up fairly quickly, and I told them to send out the paramedics, someone has been shot. Naturally, they began asking all kinds of questions that I didn't know the answers to. Who shot him? On such short notice the only thing I could think was that he must have been despondent about how things were going with Shelley and had shot himself, so I told them that I thought it was self inflicted. The operator couldn't understand what I was trying to tell her, so I told her I thought it was a suicide. The owner was in there, and her son had put a .357 to his head just a few years before, and when she heard me say that, she groaned "oh no!!!" Next question, where is the gun??? I don't know!!! How is he doing??? Is he conscious??? I don't know!!! Hold on, its out in the plant, let me run out there and take a look. I got out there, and the plant manager is there with him. Scott's eyes are wide open and unblinking. I can't see any blood or bullet hole or anything. I asked him how he is doing. He said not good, he had closed his eyes, but he opened them back up. No pulse, no breathing. I ran back to the office and told the 911 operator. Just then the paramedics rolled in. They removed his shirt and administered CPR. The police showed up just after the paramedics, and the next thing I know they have Sal in the back of one of the cars. He kept miming to us for a cigarette, but no one gave him one. I had no idea why they had him in there. The paramedics rolled him out on a gurney, and I asked one of them how he was. He answered, "he's going to be OK, but he's going to be sore"

Turns out he wasn't. The little .22 had gotten him right in the heart, and he had died almost instantly, probably without even knowing what had happened. Shelley showed up a bit later and naturally was sobbing uncontrollably when they told her what had happened. Apparently Sal had brought in a cheap little saturday night special in his jacket pocket, and when he took it off and laid it down to get ready to work, it had gone off. I don't think he was ever charged with anything. He never came back to work at the shop, tho. Probably a good thing, I have a feeling he wouldn't have been very welcome.

No more work was done that day. Everybody left early. When my wife got home from work and asked me why I was home so early, I poured out the whole story to her. At the end of my telling, she said to me "well, I'm glad you're OK", to which I replied, "I'm not."

Going to Chicago

I'm going to Chicago!!! I'm going to Chicago!!! WHOOOOOO HOOOOOO!!!

Sammy and I have been talking about doing a road trip to Chicago for a while now. He goes on about the great food dealt in his hometown, the deep dish pizza, the rib joints, the hot dog places... I get hungry every time he starts going on about it!!! Finally we inked it!!! He made mention that he was supposed to go there this weekend, but he couldn't. He had purchased a ticket for his uncle to come out at Christmas, but he wasn't able to make it either. Long story short, now he has an airline voucher to use up at some point. I said we oughtta go, and asked when a good time of year to go would be. He recommended spring time. That got me to thinking, and I asked him when opening day for the Cubs was. He got real excited about that idea!!! Anyway, its ON!!! We're going to Chicago!!! He came up to me today and told me he was walking by a radio that was playing Led Zeppelin's "when the levee breaks" just at the end part when it's going "Goin' to Chicago...." LOL!!!

Anyway, its still a couple months off, but we're both all jazzed about it!!! Going to see the Cubs at historic Wrigley Field!!! Gonna ride the El!!! Gonna eat all kinds of great food!!!

My Weekend

Saturday I went to my parents house to help my dad put the engine back in his Studebaker. He just had the vintage 327 Chevy mill rebuilt for his Christmas present. It went rather easily, even though we weren't focused on getting it all hooked up and running at this point. Basically all we did was swung it in, attached the transmission and flexplate, and bolted in the motor mounts. He had his car club meeting to go to that afternoon, so he left a little early. I tried to help my mom set up her E-mail account with outlook express, but something wasn't working quite right there. Yes, Kabila's Help Desk makes house calls, and the motto still applies: Kabila's Help Desk, where we're not really that much help!!!

Today was a day of running around. Yesterday before I left one of my son's lady friends from school called up and asked if he wanted to come to her birthday party. At noon. Of course, we didn't get a chance to get her anything, so we ended up heading out first thing this morning to get her a gift card, then over to her house to drop him off. It was the first time I had ever been to her house, which is on the far side of the freeway from ours. We got there and the girl's mom and the dad of his other lady friend who lives behind us are in the front room jamming Creedance on acoustic guitars, while another lady was accompanying them on a saw!!! It was pretty wild. We were planning to drop him off and be on our way, but we ended up staying there instead. They have a great little place, older construction as a lot of the places around here are, but with a nice plot of hillside land around it and a great view. You can see the Hollywood sign from their place.

After we left from there, all of us were hungry. I had birthday cake for breakfast. Sammy and I had been talking about pastrami last week before we got to talking about eating breakfast, and I still had the thought in my mind. I had gone to In the Skin on Friday on got my new nipple ring installed, and just down the street from there is a restaurant call The Hat (the site wasn't up when I posted this, probably not worth clicking on that link), known for their world famous pastrami. Rather high priced, but usually pretty busy. I took the family there for lunch. While we were in Pasadena I stopped by Beverages and More again and picked up a couple of sodas and a six pack of Stargazer India Pale Ale. With a name like that I had to try it (same goes for the pictured "fuckola cola", although I'm a little skurred to know what goes in that!!!) Pretty tasty, you can really taste the hops in it.

I got home and read Granny's comment that she wished she knew how to do the film strip trick that I do in Paint Shop Pro, and that got me to thinking about putting together a Kabila's Help Desk page, so I started searching for an appropriate image to use for it. As so often happens when I go searching for something, I find some other shiny object that distracts me. This particular one was a site that has some artwork, mostly done with pens and pencils and various image programs. The art is interesting and somewhat to my liking, although not at all in my style, and a couple of the titles caught my interest. One is titled Aye Dog, the other one is called Lilly SWATT. The one that linked me to it, Help Desk, I found compelling. Gotta love an artist who lists under mediums used to create their images xanax and lithium!!! I haven't updated my wallpaper page this weekend, if I do perhaps it will be one of this guy's images...

Why We Blog

Be Sure To Order This

Yesterday Sammy gave me a call in the afternoon. He had been working on a job the night before and was at the shop until after 10:00, so he hadn't come in in the morning, and was planning on skipping the whole day. Well, the plant manager called him up to see if he'd come in and take care of a couple more panic jobs. He reluctantly agreed. Anyway, he called me up and told me not to eat, we'd go and get something to eat.

We were talking about food when it was about that time, and the topic of breakfast food came up. He was saying how he loves having breakfast for lunch or dinner better than first thing in the morning. We decided that going out for breakfast was in order. We went to the Denny's just up the street. We ordered our food, and I hadn't gotten a beverage when the waitress first came around. When I ordered the food, I asked for a glass of milk when the food comes, which is usually the way I order it when I dine out. You would think its not a terribly difficult task, but you would be surprised how often it doesn't arrive. Well, when the food came, not only did she not bring my milk, but there was no flatware or napkins on our table either. Sammy and I sat there for probably about 10 seconds, then I asked him, "are you thinking what I'm thinking???" He replies, "what, that we're going to be noshing with our faces down in our plates???" Our waitress was nowhere to be seen, so we flagged down the first one that happened by and had her get us some. After she had done that, she, rather loudly, told our waitress about her mistake, and she was trying to shift the blame by telling the other girl that she had distracted her after she had cleaned the table off but before she had a chance to put the flatware out. She came over and apologized to us. I had at this point forgotten about the milk, so I made no mention. About 3/4 of the way through the meal I remembered, but at that time, what's the point??? Of course when the check came, it was charged on there. I pointed it out to Sammy, and he goes, "you never got that, did you??? When she comes back I dare you to ask her if she's new!!!" Of course, I did. She answered no, a tad defensively. I pointed out that I'd been charged for milk and hadn't gotten it. Once again she apologized, and naturally said "of course" when I told her that it was coming off the tab. To me, two major screw ups like that merit a little something, either a further reduction on the bill or some dessert, or at least having the manager come over and say that he's gonna abuse the waitress once you leave or something. I got no satisfaction of that sort, and I still left what I felt to be a fairly generous (considering the terrible service) 10% tip.

So anyway, that's my advice for the day. Order milk when your food comes, and base your gratuity on it actually showing up!!! It was actually a pretty fun and amusing dining experience. Towards the end of it I said, in a loud voice, "and THAT'S why I NEVER eat at Denny's!!!" Sammy wants to go back, only bring along our own beverages and flatware next time. I though of what I should have told the waitress after we left: "This is SO going on my blog!!!"

Party Boat

When I got home the other night, my firstborn was playing with this lego boat he'd made
Do you see on the far side of it there??? It has a tray on the side with all kinds of wine glasses and cylinders that I have to imagine are cans of beer... PARTY BOAT!!! I want to go along on it!!! Lake Havasu, here we come!!!

Certifiable

I got one thing in the mail yesterday: my certificate of being a licensed Surfcam course-completer. Cool, now I need to get a frame for it.

Today is the 12 year anniversary of the Northridge quake. I remember it, it woke me up.... I had no trouble getting up that morning. I was living in the South Bay area at the time, and while it was shocking, it wasn't especially bad there, the '87 Whittier Narrows quake was much worse to me, but I was living on the third floor of a pre-WWII wood frame apartment for that one. It just rocked and rolled all over the place!!! I do remember heading out the door to go to work that morning, and my next door neighbor was in her yard on the phone, ascared to go back inside the house. She looked at me and asked "you're not going into work, are you???" I said yea, there's NO damage here or on the roads going there, and maybe there'll be something to clean there. She wasn't going, but then again, she worked for the city, and probably got paid anyway.

I did a little looking around about the quake, and one site had it listed as the costliest U.S. disaster, at $44 billion, topping hurricane Andrew. I figure that must me out of date, I'm thinking September 11 must have ended up costing more. Hurricane Katrina could top the cost on that, too, I'm thinking. I haven't made mention here, but my dad went down to New Orleans to help with the clean up last week with a group of volunteers. He says a lot of the place looks as though nothing has been done at all. What he ended up doing down there is demolishing the insides of houses. Apparently they think the outside walls will be alright, just have to make all new interiors for them. Fascinating. He took a lot of pictures, I'll have to check them out.

Regular Weekend for Some, Long Weekend for Others

My weekend is drawing to a close. Some of my friends as well as my son get tomorrow off. I could go for another day off, but having just come off the long break I had for Christmas, it would be a little soon. I don't think I've got a paid day off until Memorial day. Not like I don't usually have three day weekends most of the time anyway. The plant manager had asked if I could come in on Friday and do a layout for the next tool. I told him no, I've got therapy, how about Saturday??? He gave me his cell number and told me to give him a call. I did, but he never picked up or replied to my messages. Out of my hands.

It was a nice weekend, very relaxing. I had the therapy on Friday, and I had made an appointment with my doctor because this virus or whatever it is was still hanging on. It seemed like it was abating a couple weeks ago, but then it came back. He prescribed me some antibiotics, as well as the Tussinex that Lilly recommended. He was going to prescribe a codeine-based syrup, but changed to that when I mentioned it. Ironically, now that I've got all that I seem to have all but kicked this.

The last two evenings I've gotten to listen in on some of the aforementioned fun with the phone. Last night I took my MP3 player and was sticking it between my headphone and my ear to record some of the completely fabricated conversations. The audio on them wasn't that great, (especially after my boys got home from the birthday party they were at and turned on the TV) but you can understand what's going on. If this remains one of those things we do, I may have enough to make a CD of these!!! One thing that tripped me out a little was when Lilly came up with a number to call that was one digit off from mine, only in the 512 area code!!!

It was a cold and drizzly day yesterday, perfect for staying in and making a crock pot of split pea and ham soup. It came out quite good, even though the honey ham that I picked up last weekend that looked like a solid chunk turned out to be sliced. I updated my wallpaper page with a picture I took just for the occasion. A lot of the plants in my yard have been blooming, and I took a picture of a bird of paradise flower. The geraniums and one of the naked ladies are blooming, and all the lilies by the driveway are coming up. They should flower right around Easter, they usually do.

Today was the opposite of yesterday, it was bright and clear, but a little chilly and windy. My wife had the idea to go to In The Skin and have them install the new nipple ring she got me for Christmas. The one I have now is a hoop with a bead on the bottom end, I think it is torsion ring. When she bought it they told her they would change it no charge. The new one is a bent barbell design with screw-on ends. Got there, and the piercer wasn't there. He'd taken the afternoon off to watch the game. So, we went out to lunch at Del Taco. After that, we stopped by Staples to get some dry erase pens (did I make mention here of the dry erase sudoku boards I made up??? I can't remember) My firstborn son wanted to look at the PC games to see what they have. There was a Harry Potter game for only $19.99 and one called midtown madness for $9.99, so he spent the bulk of the money he got for recycling there. I happened on an Atari collection of 80 arcade and 2600 games for $9.99, and my wife found a Dora the Explorer game that we got for the younger's upcoming birthday. Ended up spending a lot more than I had intended there, but the bulk of it was my son spending his recycling money. Next door to there is a Beverages and More store that I've always wondered about, so we ducked in there to look around. A lot of wines and specialty beers, and a lot of strange sodas. I picked up a Boylan Cane Cola, made with cane sugar instead of the normal high fructose corn syrup. I'd read not long ago about the Coca Cola from Mexico having a different, better flavor because of that, so I wanted to try it. It was very good, a different kind of sweetness to it.

Ever Notice...

Have you ever noticed how if you tell someone that someone else was under your refrigerator for three and a half hours, they don't even bother to question it???

Fun With The Phone

Always finding new ways to amuse themselves and others, you could defiantly say that about Lilly and Granny!!! When I joined them tonight, they were already saying I should have been there sooner. They were taking advantage of the free nights on their cell phones to call places in each others' locales, with the speaker phone function turned on. First call I was able to listen to, Granny called the Wal Mart out here on the west coast. She got the toy department and had a conversation regarding the funny teeth, to replace her broken ones for a hot date tomorrow. I had a screen shot from probably a couple years ago, back when I was still on dial up, that had an incoming call phone number on Callwave (a neat little widget if you have dial up), and Lilly called it up to ask what they wanted. They did not seem to remember calling my number (I get a LOT of wrong numbers, must be all the 2's and 7's in my number). Granny tried calling them next, but it didn't pick up. Very quickly after that someone's cousin (Suzy's, I had her ask if it was little Suzy or big Suzy) wanting to know what she was calling for. We were all rolling on the floor laughing!!! Granny does a great job playing it straight, and isn't skurred of calling anyone!!! She called up the Disneyland hotel and was trying to get room service to bring her up some chili fries. Lilly called the Bostonian hotel (I think) at Bob's suggestion, because they claim to have a baby sitting service there. The guy who picked up was unaware of that, and had to go get a second opinion. No, no babysitters there, guess its BYOB!!! OK, how about room service, I'll fill this kid up and maybe he'll go to sleep. Chili fries again, that was a recurring theme of the room service calls. I told her to tell them the kid eats the fuck outta chili fries, and she lost it and had to hang up. ROTFLMAO!!! I got the number of the Spearmint Rhino and had Granny give them a call. Of course, she had to ask them what it was, and when they said its a gentleman's club, she asked if they would let women in. Oh yea, the guy who answered was named Junior, which I had her ask him if it referred to his penis size!!! She was interested in getting a job there after she found out that she gets $15 for a lap dance, and gets to keep it all!!! Later on she called the adult bookstore that I pass by on the way to my physical therapy and was asking if they had an 8 or 9 inch dildo. The girl who answered had to go check, and she came back reporting that they have a 12 incher. Of course, had to ask if it was white or black... it was white, which prompted the comment that that is rather large for a white one!!! I think everyone's face and guts were hurting after all that laughing!!!

More Memories of 2002

I've been wanting to make some kind of post here, but I really had no idea what I'd write about. Thanks to Granny and Lilly for an idea for some blog fodder!!! I remember that Thanksgiving weekend almost like it was yesterday. I took so many pictures and we all laughed so much.

Yvonne made the comment "Laughter has such healing powers". Indeed it does. The day that Granny flew in I was at work, enjoying a somewhat leisurely day, thinking that I'd like to get in touch and see if she'd arrived, and had some little project in mind that I was wanting to make. The perfect pre-holiday day. Just a little after I had eaten my lunch I was at my table when all of a sudden I heard someone let out a very loud yell, then another one. I had no idea what was going on, but I knew it wasn't good. My first thought was that someone had been electrocuted, and I could see the girls reacting in terror. The color drained from their faces, they backed away, and their hands went to their faces. I picked up the phone and dialed 911, not knowing what I was going to tell them. Ironically, I was put on hold and was able to get enough information to tell them by the time they picked up.

One of my friends, a machine operator, had gone to clear out some debris from under the trim die on one of the machines. Picture a single edge razor blade set on edge. Now picture it about twice as thick and two inches tall, but just as sharp. He thought the die was turned off... guess you know what happened next. The blade cut his hand on a diagonal from between his middle and ring fingers to below his thumb. While I was holding, I was told he cut a couple fingers off. After I had given the operator what little information I had and the address, they asked if I could put his fingers in a plastic bag. I happened to have some small (about finger sized) ziplock bags in my desk, so I grabbed a couple and ran over to the machine. I got over there and realized that it wasn't just finger tips, but half his damned hand!!! A bigger bag was required.

The cut was very clean, and it did a lot of damage. They did a lot of surgeries, but they were not able to get his hand put back together. The plant closed earlier than planned that day, and they didn't run a second shift that night.

Just having that happen to a friend of yours in close proximity to you is very traumatic. When I got home and regained some of my composure, I got online with Lilly and Granny. It was a good thing, it really took my mind off the events of the day, and I was very glad for it. I needed something like their crazy asses at that time. Memories to last for years to come. I was glad for them having me along, and glad to be a part of it!!!

Remembering La Conchita

One year ago the hillside above La Conchita slid, killing 10. It should have been no surprise, the same hillside slid 10 years before, and several times before that. How many times in our lives do we stay in a place of eminent peril when we know we should get out??? This picture was in the paper today, and I found it haunting.

Photo by: Al Seib

HEADLIGHTS!!!

I did not think I'd be devoting this much space to just one of the vehichles at the auto show, but what can you do??? Granny, for your benifit, here's a close up of the headlight assembly. Which one do you think the high beam is??? And look in front of the headlights, see where the gas filler is??? *getting ready to create another post* LOL!!!

From The Other Side

This is for Lilly , a shot of that VW trike from the front end. The picture on the previous post was from your preferred vantage point on cars (and possibly other things, we've never gone there tho, so I don't know about that LOL) See a little better how you'd drive it now??? If you were looking at the last picture and thinking that was the front, yea that would be a bitch to drive!!! Interesting how it has different sized headlights huh??? I like the way it has the turn signals built into the front fenders!!!

And yet another beautiful day in L.A.

That pretty much describes it. Not too much blogworthy happened today, just the minutiae of daily life, but it was an exceptional day, weather-wise, for January. I hear the surf has been insanely huge of late, perhaps I shall make my way to the ocean at some point to get a look at it. However, even though there wasn't much blogworthy, blog I must... its like an itch I must scratch!!!

I got up this morning and updated my wallpaper page. I used the aforementioned picture I took yesterday of the sun setting on the opposite side of the freeway. The more I looked at the picture, the better I decided I liked it. Geocities was acting up, fucking up the picture I'd uploaded. I made mention of it there, and my conspiracy theory about their sinister ploy.

One of my elder son's friends called him up this morning and was wondering if he wanted to come over and play for a while. My wife suggested that his younger brother and my youngest should get together for a play date sometime, and his mom pretty much said "no time like the present", so it was a lot quieter than usual around here this morning. Quite relaxing.

When they came back, I made the elder load the recycling in the trunk, and we took it over to the recycling center. He got $40.00 for the haul!!! Most of it was from aluminum cans that my parents had given him. I was fairly impressed with his haul!!!

After that we hit the grocery store, since that didn't happen yesterday, and the 99 cent store. Got home and did a little yard work while the sun was still up, and took down the festivus pole. Then we made up a big pot of pasta salad, because we like the pasta salad alot!!! One of those things that we don't make a lot, but always enjoy when there is some to be had. Speaking of things I enjoy but don't have alot, I'm going to be making a crock pot of split pea and ham soup in the not too distant future. I noticed a bag of the peas in the back of the cupboard just a while ago, and there was some honey ham at the 99 cent store. I'm set!!!


Here's a picture of that trike that VW had at the auto show. Figured I might as well post some of the other pics I took here!!!

The L.A. Auto Show

When my parents were over for Christmas, my dad made mention of having a complementary set of passes to the The L.A. Auto Show, and asked if I would be interested in going. I vaguely remember saying that I would, but with the delirium of my illness and the excitement of going back to work this week I forgot.

I had my second session of the latest round of physical therapy for my finger today. Its been something like three months since I've had therapy, due to lack of approval from the insurance assholes. I go twice a week for 8 weeks, Tuesday mornings and Fridays. The first half of my sessions on Fridays is at 2:00, and the second half is at 11:00. However, in my feeble dyslexic mind I transposed the times and showed up at 11:00. My therapist was a little surprised to see me, but was good enough to work me in at that time instead. While I was hooked up to thousands of volts of electrical muscle stimulation my dad called me up and asked what time we should head off to the show. I told him around 1:30 to 2:00 would be good.

Upon leaving the therapist's office, I checked the Frys ad in the newspaper, just to see what they have on special. They had a 160 gig hard drive for $39.99 after rebates. I've been looking for one since my last computer escapade, the motherboard upgrade I did a couple months back. Right now I've got Granny's old 40 gig that she let me have in exchange for rebuilding her computer a couple years ago, and it's about 95% full already. Since I was about halfway there already, and had enough cash in my money clip, I decided to go ahead and pick that up. Now I have another project to get to...

Finally, my dad and I made it to the Auto Show. We both had our cameras, but it seemed to take quite a while before either of us were inclined to remove our lens caps. There are a lot of just plain old production cars there, and they're mostly boring. There were a few mildly customized cars there, and some interesting concept cars. Mercedes had a Rolling Stones bigger bang station wagon there, mostly just a fancy paint job and amplifiers and subwoofers in the back. Keith Richards must be rolling over in his grave. Chrysler had some nicely painted and dubbed chargers there. Then there were exotics, Ferarris and Lotus, and a brand I'd never heard of before, Spyker. VW had an interesting concept car there, a tricycle with one rear wheel. I found it interesting that the rear wheel was the driven wheel, while most of their lineup is front driven. Seems like it would be much easier to keep that kind of configuration. Over in the aftermarket and accessories hall, there was a natural gas powered tricycle, and the Zap electric cars. Off in the corner there was a guy with this unique engine he was showing. It reminded me somewhat of a rotary engine, but quite a bit different. It has a series of opposing flat discs traveling in a round torus housing. No valves, just two intake and exhaust ports, and two plugs. Very compact, very simple, and looks potentially very powerful. I tried to nail the guy down on price, but he wasn't giving.

As we were leaving I took some pictures of the downtown skyline. The sun was setting behind us, and it created a nice shade to the buildings. I took a couple of the sunset, too, but it was shooting across the freeway so they came marginal.

The Return of the Red Bucket

Got a chance to hang out last night with everybody. Granny made a post on here that expressed some releif at me not having posted anything here yet, so I guess I have to put something here!!! We all had a great time, and got to see the infamous red bucket in action!!! I had my yule hat on, Bob had on his usual backwards ball cap, and that inspired Granny to put on this hat that she has with a ponytail attached to it. She just had too much fun with it, turning it this way and that, having the hair come thru her glasses and stuff... Lilly got a hat that looked a little like a rain hat, kind of floppy, as well as her shades and South Park jammie bottoms. Bob had a photo showing myself and Lilly in a compromising position... I don't think I'll be posting that picture here, no one needs to see that!!! Will was there, too, off and on, but I have no page to link to for him. My son came over before he went to bed (and before the infamous red bucket incident, did I mention that Granny's cam seemed to take exception to that display and ceased to function???) to be seen on cam, and we all ended up throwin' up the sign!!!

Happy New Year!!!

Well, here it is New year's eve, and I'm well enough to send new year's greetings to all my blog friends. Not all the way well yet, I'm still coughing my head off and snotting. I hope I'm through with it soon, this has been enough. I haven't seen a doctor about it because I've just figured they'd tell me it wasn't nothing but a cold, and there isn't much they can do for it anyway. I've got Monday off, my last day off, and if it doesn't seem better then I may see if my doc is available.

I picked up a bottle of rum and a bottle of Champaign and a bottle of extra strength tussy at the store tonight. Old habits die hard, I can't remember the last time I've actually been out for new years. Last one that sticks out in my mind was the night I got 86'ed from a bar in Tijuana. My stomach was broken the whole next day. I would have liked to go over to Sammy's tonight for the festivities, but with the coughing I don't really feel up to it.

I did get to hang for a little bit with my East side buds, Lilly, Granny and Bob. It was only 9 for me, but it was new years for them. That was cool. Skimmed through everybody's blogs just now, and saw where Steve made mention of me on Susan's: "aye gets whumpy with his shirt off, keep it cyber." I have no idea what whumpy is, but that sure made me want to take my shirt off!!! I do keep it cyber, don't I???

Happy new year, one and all!!!

That's What I'm Doing Next Year

I hope this is readable when it posts. It looks so small here!!! If you can't read it, you can click on it and it will enlarge I've learned. But I know exactly what he means, I've got a lot more money in Runescape, as well as the ability to make some very cool armor and jewelry. Who wouldn't like a full mithiril set of armor, complete with your choice of weapon and shield??? Or, I could make a sapphire, emerald, ruby or even diamond ring. Oh, here's a good one, I could make a nice sapphire amulet and cast an enchantment on it to improve your magical abilities!!! Heck, I could even just make you something nice to eat, like a lobster dinner, or a chocolate cake.

My parents took my oldest son and his cousin on a road trip the last couple days. They're staying at Camp Pendleton Marine Base, and making a trip to Legoland. There was susposed to be rain coming in from up north, but so far it hasn't even made it so far south as the L.A. area, so I think they've stayed pretty dry. Good deal.

We made homemade pizza tonight. That was something my parents gave us for Christmas, a nice pizza pan and cutter, a box full of ingredients, and a thick little pizza recipe book. The crust and sauce were from a Chef Boy Ardee kit. The crust was good enough (and easy to make), but the sauce... well, I'd never heard of vanilla flavored pizza sauce before!!! I bammed it up with some spices and garlic, and it came around. All in all, it made for some very good pizza!!!

100!!!

Welcome to what is my 100th post here on Blogger. I can tell you've all been waiting for this momentous and special occasion.

I had wanted to send out special Christmas wishes to all my 'net buds, but I came down with a debilitating cold. After getting home Thursday evening, I mostly stayed in bed until Christmas day morning!!! I tell you, I haven't been this sick in AGES!!! I'm feeling a lot better, but I'm still coughing and snotting. I know what happened, I jinxed myself. A few weeks ago when Sammy and his family were sick, I told him, "don't worry about me, I've got a kick-ass immune system". He told me right then to knock on wood, I just jinxed myself, and damned if he didn't call it!!!

Anyway, apologies for that lapse. Hope you all had a good one!!! Thanks to Lilly and Susan for the merry Christmas wishes. Poor Granny, seems like some of the darkness within has hit her kind of hard, as is understandable during this season. My heart goes out to her.

My boys enjoyed the Christmas festivities, and the living room here still looks a bit like a catastrophic north pole industrial accident. We had originally planned on having Christmas at my parents house on the 24th, but that didn't happen, so they came up here on Christmas day instead. They brought all the gifts, as well as a lot of the food that had been left over from the day before. It was the first food I'd eaten since Thursday, and although I had little appetite and swallowing anything was very painful, it was certainly welcome. My mother and I both got near identical gifts for each other, sudoku puzzle books!!! My dad was thrilled with the custom milled aluminum license plate frame that I made for his Studebaker.

I took Nyquil for the first time that evening. I slept fairly well until about 3:30 the next morning, when I awoke with visions of unsolved sudoku puzzles in my head, and lines from David Gray's "Aint No Love";
'I feel the dampness as it creeps
I hear you coughing in your sleep
beneath a broken window pane....'

California Christmas

Credit: Genaro Molina

Too funny!!! The sign between 'em says "Don't touch aliens". I suppose a probing is out of the question???

I Dream of Michelangelo

Credit: Genaro Molina

The Boss Man

Here's another picture from Friday's Christmas party. As it was winding down and people were trickling out, Sammy dared me to get the owner to put the yule time hat on. It wasn't a thing to me, I just walked right up to him and asked him to put it on for a picture, and he did without a moment's hesitation!!! It actually came out as a really good picture of him and his wife, I think. Sammy had brought the hat and said we were going to rock-paper-scissors to see who had to wear it to the party. I won, then I asked him "This means I get to wear the hat, right???" LMAO!!!
Here he is with the hat on, as you can see it had no negative effect on his play!!! Don't they look cute together???

Interestingly enough, when it came time to fly the plane later on, we rock-paper-scissored again, and I won again... I don't know if Sammy noticed, but we both did the exact same pattern BOTH TIMES!!! I was stunned that it worked twice!!!

.... & THAT'S how I ended up a tree at 1:30 in the morning

Well, actually there's a lot more to the story, but yea, I was way up a tree at 1:30 this morning. Last night was the company Christmas party. Since I had to go all the way down into the south bay area to attend, I went in and worked for a while today. Sammy came over before the party started, and we rolled from there together. It was actually a pretty decent party. The food there wasn't that great, and the banquet room reminded me more of a storage room, with bud boxes stacked up in the corner and industrial freezers along one wall. It was interesting, for the most part all the night shift workers were at one table, the day shift workers at another, and the office people at a third. I took a bunch of pictures. Most of the ladies looked really good compared to how they usually look at work. There was one who I couldn't even connect in my mind with someone who works with me.

Sammy went outside to have a smoke with the night supervisor, Lady G, and I came out a bit later and took some rather cozy pictures of the two of them together. He was telling me later that he had been feeling up her ass while they were out there, and that he was thinking that this would have been the perfect evening to hook up with her, being as her husband knew that she was going to be at the party... Now its Sammy's turn to sing perfect situation!!!

We left out of there, and he asked me if I wanted to go to his place, have a couple shots, hang out for a while. That sounded good enough to me, so we headed off that way (we were about 1/3 of the way there from work) and got within a block of his house when he remembered that his truck was still at the shop!!! D'oh!!! Turn around, go back...

Finally we got to his place and after a while he was showing me some of the stuff he'd bought for his Godson for Christmas. One of the things is a remote controlled airplane. Well, as you may have guessed, he got it cuz he wants to play with it!!! We took it out and put it together. I suggest that we take it to the college parking lot to fly, where there's more open space. We got there and flew it a few times. It worked OK, but it has no vertical control, so it crashes fairly regularly. I got to looking around, and there's this 6-level parking structure just a ways over from there. Brilliant idea for more hang time, launch it from the roof of that!!! Sammy stayed on the ground and I sprinted up the steps to the top. I had to piss by the time I got up there, so I got a chance to pee down 6 stories, that was pretty cool. Does that count for wild, impulsive, and possibly illegal??? Or is it just juvenile and disgusting??? Either way, it was pretty cool to shoot an arc out several feet!!! After that I launched the plane, and it flew GREAT from there!!! Sammy was running back and forth trying to stay under it, but eventually it landed in the top of a rather tall bottle brush tree. As I was working my way down the steps a police unit rolled through, but luckily they didn't stop. Sammy helped boost me up into the tree and I was able to free the plane. While I was up there another police cruiser rolled by, but also didn't stop. I guess they didn't pick up on the peeing off the roof part!!! I tell you, I saw no less than 10 police units tonight!!! in spite of that, it was a really fun evening!!!

Contrasts in Burgers

Two of my favorite burger places: Tommy's Burgers and In N Out. Don't ask me which one is better, because I love them both. You poor people east of the Rockies have no idea what you're missing, unless you've ever been out here and tried 'em. The picture is of a couple of Tommy's Burgers, the sloppiest, greasiest, messiest, and tastiest chili burgers you've ever seen!!! The chili absolutely makes these burgers. I always get an order of chili cheese fries with onions whenever I go there, too.

In N Out, on the other hand, has just plain ol' burgers. Their claim to fame is that they use the freshest ingredients, and their slogan is "quality you can taste", and I'm here to tell you, you can taste the quality!!! I don't know what it is about them, but they are some of the best burgers anywhere, bar none. Hamburgers, cheeseburgers, fries and shakes are all they make there, but believe me, that's enough. I can't think of a time that I have ever been to one that there hasn't been a line. I remember going to one before they were open once, I'm thinking at 9:45 in the morning or something, and there were already 2 cars in the drive through waiting for them to open!!! Whenever I go there, I order mine "animal style" (with grilled onions).

That's where I went tonight after school tonight, In N Out. My stomach was growling during the finals. Almost 11 when I left out of there, and there was still a considerable line at the counter and at the drive through. I think I did quite well on the final tonight, and the instructor was pretty understanding about my missing items. I don't think I'll get quite as high a score as I did last semester, but I think I'll do well anyhow.

Late Nights

Two nights in a row I've ended up getting home kind of late. Yesterday was understandable, I had an appointment with my orthopedic surgeon that morning, so it was after 10 by the time I got there. Today I had a LONG program to run on my machine. I'd thought the 8000 line ones were sizeable!!! The one I ran today was 310,000 lines!!! I started it just about the first thing when I got there today, and it didn't finish up until after 10 PM.

Tomorrow is the last day of class. Finals. I'm rather unprepared. I was getting my stuff prepped yesterday on my jumpdrive to take into work and print out my projects for the notebook I have to turn in tomorrow. Well, the power went out, and it completely erased all my homework from this semester. Showed my drive as unformatted. I've got all but a couple of the projects already printed, so I'll just explain to the instructor. Or maybe I'll fake 'em at work tomorrow.

I'd wanted to get on here and see what's been going on with my friends' blogs. Doesn't look like I've missed much, except some posts have gone missing. Hope you're all doing well!!!

Nice Shot

I was out doing some yardwork this afternoon as the sun began setting, early as it does this time of year. Even earlier when you're living back in a canyon!!! The sunset was coming out rather nice, so I went upstairs and got my camera to attempt to capture the moment. Several of them came out pretty good, which worked out well for me. I hadn't updated my wallpaper page this week, so I got a nice one to use for that. It would be nice if there weren't so many power lines criss-crossing the view, but what are you going to do???

Moon Eyes

My dad and I went to the Moon Equipment car show today. Its really an enjoyable show, there's a lot of cars there that don't have the high dollar look to them, but rather a down and dirty look and LOTS of innovation!!! Wish I'd thought to bring my camera along. One thing I've noticed in the last five years or so, there seem to be a lot more ladies getting into the car scene than when I was younger. A lot of Rockabilly hoochies with tattoos in eye-catching locations!!! I even managed to get the phone number of one little cute brunette!!! OK, truth be told, she had a falcon just like mine that she'd stripped the side trim off from, and was offering it for sale. I know I'm missing a couple of pieces, so I'm going to have to take an inventory and see if she can help me out.

Constent Meyhem

Who says it was just "back then"???

"What did you steal???"

That was the question being posed to listeners on a radio program one morning this week. People were calling in with various thefts, and everything that made it past the screeners was fairly amusing!!! The among various things stolen were a Ronald McDonald statue, an 800 pound bell, the rims off a deadbeat friends' car, and a illegal immigrant crossing sign like this!!! I thought back to another perfect crime committed by myself and my good friend Sean back when I was probably 16 or 17. We, along with some other friends, had gone to a party at a gated condominium complex right across Pacific Coast Highway from the ocean. Even in the 80's those places were probably going for more than a million. It was incredibly boring and lame, we probably didn't stay more than a couple of hours all told. For some reason, we'd left at one point and returned later, I have no idea why. On one of the walks back out to the car, we noticed a sign on the block wall: "Warning: These premises patrolled by armed security patrol" We took that as a challenge I guess, and decided we must have it for our own. It took a little bit of doing to get it unfastened, and then we had to get it out to the car across a busy parking lot shared with a shopping and restaurant complex. It was sizeable. We laid it flat, covered it with our jackets, and carried it out to the car, feigning that it was incredibly heavy. We caught a lot of slick eye, and one person crossing our path said "looks like you've got a live one there!" LMAO!!! He had it hanging in his room for years after that, and then in his car hole.

Now I feel like doing something wild, impulsive, and possibly illegal. I have no idea what, but I'm feeling up for it. I'll keep you posted.

Until such time as that happens, please share your crime and theft stories here, and I shall live vicariously through them!!!

We Shall Never Forget

A date which will live in infamy. One of those days that prompts people to say "we shall never forget". I don't know how many people actually remembered that today was Pearl Harbor day. I usually hear something on the radio or television making mention of it, but I didn't hear anything about it today. It was mid-day before I wrote down the date, and I remembered at that point. How many days that we shall never forget are lost in the sands of time???

One of my most vivid memories (being as I was born more than a quarter century later) was a few years back. One of the guys I worked with, Fred, an old, grizzled, crazy looking guy didn't come in that day. His excuse was that he was feeling nostalgic about it being Pearl Harbor day. He was something like 2 or 3 when it had happened.

At least he remembered.

512!!!

Must have been a lucky day!!!

Bob's Art

Here's a couple of pictures that Bob the not-often blogger and the crew's unoffical scetch artist did on Friday evening. They needed to be shared, I think he caught our essences quite well!!!

Perfect Situation

My doctor's appointment went quite well. I got a couple of new prescriptions for my back pain, and I like my new doctor well enough. He's in Glendale, so of course most everyone working there is Armenian. Main thing is he actually is there on Fridays, so I don't need to miss work to see him!!! He wanted to have my blood worked up since its been a few years since I've had that done, and he asked me if I had eaten anything yet that day. I had woken up that morning and showered and got on here and blogged until it was time for me to go, without having had a chance to eat, so there was perfect situation number one!!!

His office is a couple of blocks from the hospital and the surrounding medical buildings. It costs $1 an hour to park in the parking garage there, but the parking at the doctors office is free. I just hoofed it over to the lab by the hospital and saved myself the parking fee, as well as the aggravation of parking there. Perfect situation number two!!! It didn't even rain on me either way, which it did off and on most of Friday.

I got to the lab a little before they took lunch. The guy behind the counter had the same first name as I did, that was interesting. It didn't take them long to get me in there and draw out my blood, which was good because I was very hungry and was needing to pee. After they took my blood, they gave me a cup to go get them a urine sample, I didn't know they were going to want that!!! Perfect situation number three!!!

After doing the shopping and banking and picking up my new prescriptions I came home and was able to chat with Lilly, Granny, and Bob, as well as briefly with an old friend I hadn't seen in a while. The messenger service was messing up at first, but it got better, and we all got stupid and silly. A fun time was had by all

Here's to good
friends!!!

I ended up falling asleep on the couch after I ate some, probably around 11:30 or so. I awoke around 2:30 or 3, and I had all these pics I needed to save before I'd be able to shut down my comp and go to bed. I didn't feel much like it, but I made myself, and by the time I was done I wasn't sleepy anymore. I played some runescape, then noticed Granny was on and chatted her up some. My wife got up at some point to pee and was sure to come out and give me some shit about not having come to bed and being on the comp too much and bla bla bla. Then just hovered over my shoulder for too damned long. Funny how I was just posting yesterday morning how she doesn't like to be touched while she's sleeping and I enjoy the spooning. Doesn't like to be touched, but gives me shit for not being in there next to her, go figure!!!

I got to read the paper and listen to Handel on the Law in peace. Speaking of peace, William Wolf Handel, Esq. has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize!!! That is actually very amusing if you ever listen to his show, he's anything but. They got him nominated just to illustrate how easy it is to do that, in light of the Tookie Williams activists. Long story. I turned Granny onto his show, too.

I updated my Wallpaper page with a great pic I found a while ago with an Aussie kind of theme to it, in honor of our antics last night. WEEEEEEEE OOOOOOOOOO!!!

Later on in the day, I set up a Festivus pole in the front yard. I strung lights around, in breaking with Festivus tradition, but it looks good to me!!! I didn't end up taking a nap as I thought I might end up doing, but I'm about out of steam as I type this. We went to Wally World and got some essentials, as well as taking care of a couple of Christmas presents and a birthday present.

I got home late, but in time to take a couple of pics of the new yard decoration and then catch the crew before they all went off to bed. Lilly and Granny were ripped!!! No one had their cams going, but that may have been a good thing, apparently Granny was nekked and had a bucket in case she needed to piss!!! Lilly was going on about how she had shaved up some, a first for her I believe. It was amusing, but I wish I'd been with 'em longer, as they both went off to bed not long after that.

Oh yes, the title to this post actually refers to the song by Weezer of the same name. I just got that song the other day, and Foo Fighters DOA and wanted to make myself a CD with those on it. I made it, but I spaced out on putting Perfect Situation on it!!! A perfect situation, but not such a perfect disc!!!

How Could It NOT Be Good???

What a good day I had yesterday!!! I've always said any day I get to weld is a good day!!! I actually got up close to "on time" for a change, mostly from having to piss. Naturally I woke up with a pee hard-on. I briefly tried rubbing it up against my wife's ass, but she didn't appreciate that much. Truth be told, she doesn't much like being touched while she's sleeping at all, bad for me because I like nothing better than to spoon. Oh well, you take what ya got, huh??? Too much information??? Well, that's my life!!!

I got to work only a couple minutes after the "official" start time and fired up my CNC. The day before I'd been roughing out a prototype for a frisbee, and something funky had happened to my Z axis. Fixed that up and re-did that (fortunately, it was to the plus side instead of the minus!!!) and then generated a finishing tool path. Poor little small-brain HP about choked trying to do that. 72,000+ lines of code!!! Somewhere in there, Rosa, the other CNC guy's helper (I'm going to need a helper one of these days...) came over and asked if I could do a little welding for her.

Apparently the motor on one of the band saws has been replaced with one that has a smaller drive shaft, and the big wheel had a sleeve welded into the middle to make it fit. Only tacked in four places, though, and it finally gave out. First thing I tried to do was change the tungsten on the welder to the type for welding aluminum. I looked all over and could not find the right parts (collet) to make it work. About the time I was going to give up I saw Sloppy Joe going by and asked him if he'd seen it, and he said no, but he had some brand new ones!!! Good deal!!! Then, since it had been probably close to a year since I'd welded aluminum, I had to try and remember the correct settings. I didn't at first, but finally got it. I had to lay an arc to the thing for the longest time before it would bead up nice, a large aluminum piece like that will soak up the heat thru the whole thing like a sponge!!! When it finally got hot enough, the weld fairly well flowed around the whole edge, making a beautiful weld!!! There's nothing like the feeling of having that little sun of superheated plasma, sheathed in a ball of argon gas, at your fingertips!!! A comment that I've remembered from my high school welding class days, one of the students saying TIG welding is so clean you could weld in a tuxedo. True statement. One of these days I'll have to try that!!!

The L.A. Times had an article on blogging in L.A. that caught my interest. I'd tell more about it, but I have a doctors appointment I must be off to. However, there was one that caught my interest for the words they quoted in the article, Heathervecent. Also caught my interest because she lives in my 'hood. Check out her links on the left side to the cover pictue from the article, now there's some great Hotoggin'!!! I didn't realize that it was her on the picture until I checked her blog. I was considering cropping the picture and using it as my weekly Wallpaper image, but its kind of small. I could dig it out of the trash can and scan it, I guess, I'm still deciding on that. Scanned newspaper sometimes doesn't come out so good.

Happy Hump Day

I had a good day today. I learned how to do 3-D contouring on my CNC, as well as figuring out (once again, I think I'll remember it this time) how to control my machine directly from the PC. Now I'll be able to cut the tool for that double dildo!!! Guess you could say I've got that dildo licked now!!! LOL!!! Now, if our company would just pay up with our supplier so I can get some metal to cut it in....

I was making up a prototype this evening for a frisbee, since I'm now able to do this kind of thing. I'd written a program last Wednesday for the SHAPE of the thing, but didn't have the skills to make a cut-path until today. It makes for a sizeable program, I think something like 20,000 lines.

While I was cutting it, around 5:30, a ball of tape came flying in from behind me. I knew right then: Sammy's back!!! He'd come back in to work on a die, the guy who does some stuff at night who was going to do it called in sick. We talked a while while it was cutting, then I asked him if he was interested getting some dinner chow. He was up for it, so we went to our favorite place, El Tarasco. They've been fixing up the place, painting it, new windows, new block walls in the parking lot, new sign out front, and new menus. They're doing murals on all the interior walls, and its really shaping up. It used to be a weird little hole in the wall place, but its looking nice now. Used to be the place was mostly deserted in the evenings when we'd go there, but it was probably close to 3/4 full tonight. I don't know if that's all attributed to the new decor, but good for them!!! Good for us, too, our usual table was available when we got there!!!

Boring!!!

First day of the week back at work, and damn, it was BORING!!! I had a couple things to do, but not near enough to keep me going for a full ten hours. I was considering taking off and telling them to pay me one of my vacation days (they didn't pay me for the last couple of vacation days I took, after all their paperwork and everything... I didn't say a thing, I didn't need the money and I'll just keep the extra days!!!) One across on the crossword puzzle today: BORING!!!

Around the middle of the day something interesting happened. They brought me out an 18" double dildo vibrator with dual controls in a nice shade of purple!!! They want me to make a tool for it. I'm not completely convinced I'm "up to it", so to speak, but I'll give it a try. I talked to the other CNC operator and asked him how to go about doing it, and he gave me some guidance. I spent the rest of the day design programming the tool, then attempting to generate tool paths for it. The comp I use at my CNC to generate my tool paths with is a weak old HP running what could possibly be the worst operating system ever foisted upon an unsuspecting public, Windows ME. I got it do one end somewhat, but after that it kept crashing the CAD program. I'd try to recover, and it would freeze. I did a couple of re-starts, and eventually the CAD program wouldn't even start. That was the point I said enough is enough, I'm giving it a rest until tomorrow. Ended up shorting myself by ten minutes, but oh well.

I rolled out at 5:12 and was home by 6:15. Not too bad for rush hour. I was actually able to get some chat time in with the balance of my East Side crew, so it was a much better evening than it was a day!!!

Over the weekend, I managed to advance my smithing skill on runescape. I'm now able to smith adamant bars and make them into daggers without first pounding a dwarvian stout (a dark, thick, strong ale). If I do have a dwarvian stout I can make them into axes. I can then sell them for (guess how much!!!) 512 gold pieces!!!

Ends Too Soon

The wonderful four day weekend is drawing to a close. I would rather it not, but that's the way it goes. I really didn't do much of anything, but it was a good nothing!!! I didn't end up going down to my parent's house yesterday, they came back here and picked up my nephew. And hung around here for a LONG time!!! I had about enough of the racket and was getting ready to split to do the grocery shopping, but my wife was saying she wanted to go, too. Then everyone decided they had to eat. Blew most of yesterday with that. Finally got out to shopping, and it was very windy and a little chilly out. Winter has come to Cali!!! I read Serenity's blog, and I can't even imagine living like that.

I feel like I haven't blogged in a while, even though I did manage to get a wordy post yesterday morning. Lilly, don't you worry about saying anything coherent, just the occasional weeeeeeeee ooooooooo to let me know you're there will do fine!!! LOL!!! Seriously, I appreciate any feedback I get from anyone. I always seem to think of things that I want to mention here, but forget when I'm at the keys.

One of those things I had wanted to make mention of here is I discovered how to thwart some anti-piracy measures on a CD. I'd recently gotten a disc that, when inserted into a comp, wants to install some damned software for it to play. The disc is made by BMG, so naturally I was thinking it was one of these Sony-BMG ones with the hidden file installer wherein trojans and viruses can lurk. I went to the Sony site to find out about getting it replaced, and found it wasn't on the list, so I took a closer look. Turns out it was a different software, and all you have to do to get around it is to hold down the shift key to prevent it from auto-playing when you insert it, and you can rip all the tracks flawlessly!!! Wery cool!!!

I was able to get a chance to chat some the last couple nights. Granny was absent both nights. I wonder if she's still adjusting to her new meds??? Lilly had her friend Pearlie there all this weekend, and I think that was just about long enough for her!!! She pointed her cam over towards her bed where she was sleeping, and I snapped a pic, but you really can't see anything, so I'm not going to post it here. Lilly had a new top on that was pretty cool, if I were to post a pic of anything here related to chat it would have been that. Oh yea, she modeled Chat Suit #3 for Bob and I, but once again, I don't think that's one I'd put a pic of here. She also dragged in a new friend she's found who's located between her and Granny (THERE'S a thought to keep ya up at night!!!), and he seemed to fit right in.