September 2004

9-22-4
Star Wars OT was released on DVD yesterday. My rant is too long and boring to post here.
Follow the link if you want to read my mixed feelings on it.
Star Wars (Original Trilogy)
Why do they insist on messing with a good thing until they turn it to mud?

9-20-4
Busy weekend. Busy for at least the next 3 weekends ahead. Ah, the price of living life...

Birthday weekend. Teresa turned 33 Friday, I turned 32 Saturday. Thank you to everyone that called and/or e-mailed, we appreciate it.
I missed almost EVERY one of your calls since we were out running around from dawn till dark.
It was kind of cool having 10 messages (we just got our phone line back) on the machine, 9 of them saying Happy Birthday.

Friday, Jerry took us out to dinner at Outback. Lizzy broke the rules and told the waitress that it was Teresa's birthday. If Lizzy goes missing, we'll know who to look to.

Saturday, Becca and Teresa made me breakfast. Very cool. It was the only meal we ate at the house all weekend. Later on, I reclaimed the back-yard. It was so overgrown I felt guilty cutting it back, like I was clearcutting the rain-forest or something.
Teresa, Kate and the girls took me out to lunch where I watched the Red-Sox get thrashed. (Doing the happy dance here...) Even though she's not a baseball fan, Teresa thinks it's cute to cheer for the Red-Sox but she doesn't understand that is a divorceable offence in my family.
T and Kate went out to do their 'girl' thing (nails and such) T had her nails done real short this time because we're going to drop the transmission in her Mustang in the next couple of weeks (When?! We're booked up, no time to do it!!! We'll find time somewhere I suppose). Then we all went out to Wasabi's for dinner.

Sunday, Jerry watched Becca while Teresa and I went to the Jaguar/Bronco game. Not being a football fan, I rooted against the Jags since Teresa rooted against the Yankees Saturday.
At the end of the game, it looked like they were going to lose it in the last minute, as usual, so Teresa PROMISED me she would never root for the Red-Sox against my Yankees again.
I worked my mojo and sure enough, 2 plays later the Broncos fumbled the ball and the Jags recovered, Jaguars win. Ugly, but it's a win and now I won't have her cheering against the Yankees this October... I'm holding her to this promise even though she was under the influence of 3 very large Margaritas at the time.
Anyway, after the game, we walked over to Metro Park where Thom and Kate picked us up on their boat. It was nice not having to deal with traffic or parking. We spent a few hours on the river and hung out for a little while.
Finally we picked up Becca, went to dinner at Campeche Bay (1 more Margarita) and returned home exhausted.

Busy weekend but I guess if you're not busy, you're not living...

9-11-4
Hey kids, Lesson for the day;
When you step on the brakes and it sounds like you stepped on some "Capt'n Crunch" cereal, it's too late.

Back in late April while I was fixing up the H8Mobile for my new job, Thom and I saw that the brake pads were worn down pretty low. We decided to change them 2 weeks from then since I didn't have the $25 at the time to replace the pads and the $30 or so if the rotors needed turning.

That was well over 7360 miles ago! (40 miles each way, 92 work days + personal driving on the weekends in case you're checking the math Dad)

Brake pads are NOT supposed to look like this!

The good news is that thanks to some help from Thom and Wade, I now know how to replace EVERYTHING behind the front tires. Instead of having the rotors turned, replace them! Instead of repacking the bearings, replace them! Seals, racings, everything. The only thing I could keep was the caliper itself and the brake line! We spent all day and half the night chasing parts all over town.
Another quick lesson, auto parts stores differ GREATLY on prices. New rotors cost $69 each at one place, $34 each at a most others and only $14 at the place I bought them at. Bearings that sold for $10 each were available for $5 each somewhere else. If you're willing to run ALL OVER town and have good friends that work for the "thank you" at the end, then you too can replace your front end for the low, low price of $150. Not too bad but it would have been better to spend the $25 in April.....

9-11-4
Cool, 2 lessons in 1 day. This one is a good one kids, listen up;
Never pull your glasses case out of your pocket when an officer of the law is confronting you. Yes, I know, It's a simple rule and easy to forget but I promise, you'll only forget once!

After working on the truck, Becca wanted to stay the night with Julia. I decided to take Teresa out because it is rare we have an evening to ourselves. We went out to "Campeche Bay" and T had a few Margaritas, we had chips etc. There was a live music act on the patio and we heard them do a pretty good rendition of "Diamonds and Rust" (by Joan Baez, not Judas Priest). After we were done, we decided to stop in at "Cecil's" to visit her sister Karen and her husband Jeff.
"Cecil's" is a pretty quiet neighborhood type bar. My father took me there for my first (legal) drink. Teresa and I have been there 3 or 4 times to visit Karen & Jeff but we're not the barfly types. Why? Well, mostly because of the stuff like the story I am telling you now.
The night went pretty smooth. They had Karaoke singers, darts and "Golden Tee" golf. Jeff and I played pool. There was some old drunk guy who kept telling us it was his 63rd birthday. He kept flirting with Teresa and trying to buy me beer.

Around 1:40am some guy, an ex-regular who has been banned from the bar for bad behavior, came in. He was carrying on, throwing things, threatening the barmaids and fumbling for something in his pocket. A gun? A knife? A picture of his mother? I don't know and I don't WANT to know. Karen immediately protected Teresa by getting her behind the bar. Jeff, me and some of the regulars became bouncers and influenced this man to leave while the barmaid called the cops telling them the whole story, including the mystery contents of the pocket. Everything returns to normal and we prepare to leave.
Now Mr. 63 year-old-drunk-guy wants to fight some kid because of some comment. Both are acting tough and I escort Mr. 63 out the door telling him, "C'mon, you don't want to fight him on your birthday, c'mon, let's just go home now...." Etc. At the same time we go out the front door, the police show up responding to the previous call. They see me holding Mr. 63 and they come over and talk to him, "hey, didn't I have to talk to you yesterday?" At that point, I back up, I'm out of there. Nice guy but he obviously has other problems besides being a drunk. He starts getting belligerent with the cops and assumes the position, wiggling his butt "daring" them to search him. He turns around and reaches for his glasses in his pocket.

NOT A GOOD IDEA. Let's examine the situation shall we?

The cops are responding to a disturbance call at a bar at closing time. They've been told that someone may have a weapon in their pocket. They already know this man as a trouble maker.

BANG, ZOOM! Down to the ground he goes.
Now kids, here is a pop quiz.

When a police man corrects your actions by taking you to the ground, do you;
A: Lie there silently and perfectly still.
B: Move into a "spread eagle" position and await further instruction.
C: Kick at the officers' legs and reach up for their belts.

Well, Mr. 63 will have to re-take the quiz later because he failed to respond in a way as such to avoid getting his ass kicked by 3 provoked policemen.
To add to the scene, only 4 or 5 of us saw the whole deal. Everyone else (including Teresa) only saw the cops kicking a sweet 63-year-old man lying on the ground on his birthday. Now the cops have half the crowd yelling, "You don't do that, he's an old man!, I want his badge number!, Police brutality!, But it's his birthday!" Some of the other stupid drunks actually started over to fight the cops with a, "Let's see them do that to someone their own age" mentality. Luckily (?) they were restrained by other drunks that were only partially stupid. It probably would have been better off letting them get beat down and spend a night or 3 in jail to contemplate their decision making skills.

I personally think the cops did a great job. Crowd control (drunken, redneck crowd control at that) while dealing with Mr. 63 all without drawing a weapon! We trust these men to protect us and they do. Sometimes they have to use force on hard-headed people. So be it. No cop has ever kicked me. Do you know why? Because I never give them any reason to do so. Never has a cop has ever knocked on my door, said hello, and then beat me down. Not once! Everyone has seen the video of the cops subduing Rodney King but how many have seen a tape of Rodney driving 110 mph, high on angel dust, trying to run over cops? Until the cops start abusing law-abiding citizens, or even criminals that can follow instructions once caught, I'll trust them to take care of the job we have entrusted them to do.

I count my own stupidity for staying at a bar that late, nothing good ever comes of that. Every once in a while, we have to re-establish why we don't hang out in bars.

9-9-4
I went through last night and this morning and changed all the colors to something more normal. You like? I also put up a new front page now that I decided to actually keep the webpage going.

I'm at work already, it's 5:30a. I had to run by the airport at 5am so now I'm here and waiting on the day to start.

It looks like hurricane Ivan may hook around and get us all again. What fun huh? I never trust the forecasts more than 2 days out but they've been close enough so far. We'll see.

9-8-4
OK, It's been September for 8 days now and I haven't updated a thing...
We've been busy with a lot of stuff. Most importantly Hurricanes.

The Bonnie/Charlie double team came through and whipped everyone into a frenzy. Nothing much here but rain and unsubstantiated fear.
Then along came Frances. Didn't expect much but boy was I wrong!!!
We went out to get some lunch before the storm hit. When we got home, the wind had already picked up and tore down a limb from the magnolia covering our driveway. I got out there and cut it off and thought we were done.
This would account for the "before" picture below.

A few hours later the storm has really picked up speed and the wind is ripping! Teresa dropped a pan in the kitchen and the dog barked so she didn't think anything of it but I know I heard a crash bigger than that. I went out front to check it out and saw the whole top of the tree laying on the roof!

I used up all my luck on this one, as the trunk fell, it shattered a smaller limb below it. It then impaled itself on the lower limb and balanced there, keeping it from coming through my den! The limbs hit the roof but didn't damage it. If it hadn't fallen onto that lower branch it probably would have ended up IN my den.

I went out into the storm, moved the cars and cut off the extended limbs that were actually hitting the house. If you've never cut down a tree in hurricane force winds with the rain blinding you every 30 seconds all the while worrying if the tree was going to lose its balance and fall on you, DON'T! It sucks!
It was actually pretty comical, I was out there with a 20' pole saw hacking away and about every minute or so the winds would gust REAL bad and I would run away into the center of the yard. The wind would subside and I'd cut some more. Repeat for 3 and a half hours. As soon as I got everything off the roof and away from the phone/cable drops, I retreated into the house.
I'm sure my neighbors thought it was really amusing. Probably would have won the $10,000 from the funny video show if it HAD fallen on me...

There is a lot of tree still standing but unfortunately it looks like the whole tree will have to come down. It's too thin where it split and all the weight is now on one side. It was already leaning that way and now I am afraid it will come down on the van and truck. I'm going to try to do some creative "tree sculpture" to try to leave it up but i think it may be a loss. Pity, it really was a nice tree.
Anyway, I was cutting and Teresa was clearing so no pictures from that part but here's three from the next day.

Onward to October 2004 Back to Updates