May 2007

May 2007

Thursday, 5-31-7

We go to Disney every year. This was the best trip we've had in years. Teresa set up all the plans. She made the reservations and every time she asked what we were planning to do for the day I told her it was up to her. So she essentially ran the entire show and it was the best time the three of us have had in a long, long time.

We normally stay at the "All-Star" resorts. They are the cheapest Disney property like the purples in Monopoly. (More like the light-blues, Disney doesn't have purple properties...) We always figured that a hotel room is a hotel room and why pay $300 when you can pay $89? We like staying "on property" so we can take advantage of the busses and monorails. That way we don't have to worry about parking, driving or drinking too much.

This time we decided to try something new. I was tired of the same old resorts and wanted to try a step up. We booked at the Port Orleans resort and I will never go back to the All-Stars. The rooms were beautiful! Fancy headboards, ceiling fans, huge beveled framed mirrors, old fashioned sinks and tiled bathroom floors, there was a curtain separating the bathroom and sink area from the bedroom (but a real door between the tub/toilet and sink areas). It just felt like an old hotel in the French-Quarter. The room was right in front of the pool and behind the river. I sat and watched the river flow by and Becca loved the pool because it had a water slide in it. The iron balconies and gates really transported me back to New Orleans. I used to love walking down the allies and looking at the real attractions like people and buildings, Bourbon Street is for boring tourists!

Our building was directly across from the pool and in front of the main lobby but you barely noticed it because of the trees and scenery they put around there. It was nice because after a long day, we didn't have a long walk to the room but it never felt like we were at the main entrance. The other cool thing was that Port Orleans has its own busses and with the six stops available at the resort, "French-Quarter" was always the first drop off so we never had to sit on the bus for long.

We arrived Friday night and checked in to the room. Then we went down to Downtown Disney for a while. Teresa had made an appointment for Becca at the "Bibbity-Bobbity-Boutique". It's a salon where they dress up little girls like princesses and let them have fun with makeup and hair and stuff. I was afraid Becca would be too old for it but there were girls much older than her in there having fun. Becca tried to play it off like she was just doing it for Mommy but you could tell she liked being pampered. The telling part was the fact that she slept in her hair so she could wear it to the park the next day. She had fun. We walked around and visited the shops. I fell in love with some more artwork but I'm still hesitant to drop $400 on anything that just sits on the wall. Especially since I know that as soon as I open that door, there are literally dozens of pieces I'd like to have.

We avoided the "Goofy Candy Company" this time. That's the place with the customized candy apples that made us so sick last time. I have to learn moderation. They say you can put anything on these apples so I try to fit EVERYTHING on them. I really need to unlearn my hoarding and gluttony behaviors.

We walked by the House of Blues and I just wanted to cry. "Mastodon" was playing that night and I wasn't going to see them but worse was the cruel trick they played on me later in the week. We were leaving Tuesday night and one of my favorite bands would be playing there Wednesday night. "Dimmu Borgir" and "Unearthed" were going to be there and I had to be back at work in Pensacola. So as I type this up on Thursday morning while I sit here and wait for Sprint and Harris to get their shit together, I realize it would have been so easy to blow off work and hit the show. And I could have gotten away with it if it weren't for my pesky conscious!
We got back to the hotel and there was a musician playing in the area between the lobby and the bar. I got Teresa a Hurricane and we sat and watched this guy play everything from the guitar, to the sax to the steel drums. He was a lot of fun.

The parks were fun. We got to ride all of our favorites and see all of the new upgrades like the "Pirates of the Carribean" additions (they are mild additions and don't take anything away from the classic ride). I got everyone to the park early on Saturday morning to see the "rope-drop" opening of the park only to find that they don't really do that any more. They hold you just beyond the entrance turnstyles and there's no rope. I had hear that they let everyone in to Main Street and that there are ropes at the spokes leading from the main hub, "Tomorrowland", "Adventureland" and so on... I had never gotten there as they open before and I really wanted to see it once. Boy was I disappointed. Once again, I built something up in my head, imagined it perfect and when real life isn't as exciting as it is in my head, I get all glum. Well, we were on the front row of the mob waiting in to get in and that would be cool enough. There were a lot of Disney people coming and going and one of them approached us. We were asked if we would like to take a survey and of course we said yes. We were led in to the park and sat down in front of a computer where it asked why we came to Disney, where we were from, where we were staying, how important this or that was to our vacation... After we were done taking the survey, the guy said we could wander Main Street until the park opened, just don't go past the hub. Aside from ten or twenty other survey takers, we had the place to ourselves! It was kind of spooky. We made our way up to the hub, got Becca's annual picture with the statue and enjoyed the place without people pushing or shoving. There were indeed ropes across the spokes leading into the various lands. Becca looked down Main Street and said, "Here they come!" It was a mob of people flowing into the park, most of them running toward "Space Mountain" and "Splash Mountain". The welcome message played over the loud speakers and I got my rope drop. We headed into "Fantasyland" because that's where the lines get ridiculous later in the day. Teresa has wanted to ride "Peter Pan" for the last three trips but the line is always two freaking hours long! We were the second people on the ride. We hit "Peter Pan", "Snow White" and "Small World" before there was even any semblance of a line. We abandoned "Fantasyland" to the children and soccer moms and headed off to the thrill rides. Still with relatively short lines, we rode "Thunder" and "Splash" and decided to take a second run on "Splash" because it is Teresa's favorite. Becca decided to do the "I'm scared" trick and she wasn't happy that we made her go a second time. Later on she punished us by making us hit "Small World" a second time. I tried to explain to her, NO ONE hits this ride twice. Most people never hit it a second time in their life! We always hit it once a trip but twice!? She was just getting back at us for "Splash".

As the weekend went on the lines got longer and the people got ruder. Something to be expected while in Disney over Memorial Day weekend. We ended up in Epcot just about every day. It is my favorite place in the parks and I could just sit there all day. We hit Germany, Morocco and the UK for meals and Teresa got a few of her margaritas from Mexico. While waiting for dinner in the UK pavilion, we saw Alan Thicke shopping in one of the stores. He had a young kid with him as well as a Disney employee escorting him everywhere. I took Becca out of the store (so she wouldn't stare when I told her) and asked her if she ever watched "Growing Pains" and told her it was the dad. We went back in and she thought it was cool to see someone from the TV world standing right in front of her. Becca and I sat in with the drummers in the African pavilion and as usual, Becca got upset that she couldn't keep up with Daddy. I kept trying to encourage her but she just got so frustrated. The workshop is run by a large African man and his wife. She is an excellent dancer and I'd love to see her dance in an atmosphere outside of Disney where she could really let loose. She kept trying to get Becca into the groove and we all had a lot of fun. Between drumming they tell tribal stories. A few years back I remember them telling about how man tamed animals and how woman tamed man. This time it was about man's discovery of music. We sat and talked with them after the workshop was over and he invited me to play with him if I was going to be around the rest of the weekend. Poor Teresa stood there watching with nothing to do. There was also a lot of live music around Epcot. (No Dimmu Borgir, but) Gary Puckett played the main stage in front of the America pavilion. I had to stop and watch "Off Kilter" at the Canada pavilion. I was looking forward to seeing them and I was really hoping to catch one of their performances. I also got to see "Muzickanten" while we ate dinner in Germany. There was a sitar player, drummer and a belly dancer in Morocco when we sat down but by the time we finished ordering lunch, they had finished their set. Becca and Teresa got some beautiful Henna work done on their wrists by a Moroccan woman. I bought a DIY henna kit for home but I don't know how well that will turn out. I also bought a lot of alcohol. Aside from all the beer I drank in the different countries, I bought a bottle of "Apfelkorn" from Germany and a bottle of "Linie" from Norway. I'm really trying to become an alcoholic.

I really could have spent all four days entirely within Epcot. But luckily for Teresa and Becca, we had the "park-hopper" tickets that let us spend the morning in one park, have lunch in another and watch the fireworks in yet another... We can come and go as we please. We went over to the Disney Studios and had fun there. We rode the "Tower of Terror" a few times and Becca loved it. She still played the "scaredy cat" game but she had a lot of fun. The Aerosmith rollercoaster was fun and she enjoyed that a lot more than Tower. We had lunch at one of our favorite spots, the "50's Prime Time Diner". When you go in they take your name and the lobby looks like a living room from the 50's. The servers are all wearing 1950's clothing and talk like you are their little brother, even if they are younger than you. After waiting about five minutes, they announce that "Mom is ready for the Morgan kids. Hey Morgan kids, lunch is ready!" The lady sat us at a kitchen table and told us that she's our big sister Susan and that Mom wanted her to baby sit us today. At one end of the table was an oversized TV that played clips from "I Married Joan", "Dick Van Dyke Show", "Car 54" and all the rest. The dessert menu was on a Viewmaster but you couldn't order dessert unless you finished all of your lunch. Teresa and Becca had the fried chicken but I played along and had the meatloaf. It was incredible. I also had a peanut-butter and jelly milkshake. Before you gag, it was pretty damn good. I don't think I'll ever order it again because it was pretty weird, but it was good! If you got caught with your elbows on the table, the entire restaurant knew about it. After I finished, she took my plate to the table next to us and told them that their plate better be as empty as this one or they wouldn't be allowed to play outside this afternoon. It was a lot of fun.

Tuesday we ended up spending the entire day in the two water parks, "Blizzard Beach" and "Typhoon Lagoon". Blizzard Beach was nice but the lines were long and aside from the one really big slide (130' drop and they made me get on it while they refused to try it!) it was almost the same as Typhoon Lagoon yet Typhoon seemed quieter and more friendly. Blizzard was more popular but Typhoon was our favorite. It kind of felt like the old "River Country" water park they used to have. Teresa was dying to get into the wave pool and we ended up spending a most of our time in it. We tried a lot of the other slides and rides but that wave pool was their favorite. It is just part of the game, if you want to slide down a five story water slide, you have to walk up five stories of steps. There's a lot of walking and climbing going on in those damn water parks... I didn't tell them until we left for the day that the wave pool made me motion sick and that I had a splitting headache. They were smiling and having so much fun that I was willing to stay in that pool just to see the both of them so happy. It drops an eight to ten foot wave every 90 seconds! That was bearable but for a little while it was making "Bobbing" waves like a giant ship had just passed by and we were caught in it's gigantic wake. Ten minutes at a time of bobbing up and down in five foot seas... I was sick! But that was only for an hour or so. The other three hours of wave pool time was spent riding and dodging the giant "surfing" waves. I was sooo happy to get out of there but I did have a lot of fun with Teresa and Becca.

We returned to Port Orleans to say good bye to Disney and to get our car. It really is a beautiful hotel, I look forward to staying there every time now. I tried to drive home. I got as far as Lake Mary and Teresa wanted Red Lobster for dinner. We ate and I was suddenly overcome with all the heat, walking and bobbing up and down we did that day. Teresa drove home and the next morning I headed out here to Pensacola for work. I'm stuck out here over the weekend and that's probably a good thing. I'll put my feet up, relax and just read my books. After a vacation like that, I need a vacation.

Tuesday, 5-22-7

I realize that my previous dispatch had no cohesive thoughts, just the spent ramblings of a moron. I apologize for that. I was on my last waking moments when I typed it out, knowing I was about to pass out into a freaking coma. I spent all weekend yawning and getting back up to speed. Tired just doesn't cover how I felt, I was truly exhausted. Luckily, the busy schedule and frantic drive was done on Wednesday which meant that when I (barely) arrived home alive on Thursday morning I had all weekend to catch up. In between all of our scheduled appointments and all but still, it's nice to be home with Teresa and Becca.

I felt better by Friday night and although I was still tired, I was back to normal because "tired" is my standard MO. I felt fine Saturday evening but had trouble sleeping. Sunday morning the bottom fell out. I spent all morning "being sick" and all day recuperating from the pure violence of the outbreak. I remember being sicker and I have been told I have created more "cinematic displays of protein spills" but most of those stories involved mass quantities of alcohol. I had none in me when the fit started and by the end there was nothing at ALL left in me. Even into Monday afternoon I haven't eaten much. Even the smell of food makes my stomach lurch. I spent most of Sunday holed up in my den pretending to watch movies and sleeping through them. I have a really good movie I want to watch but it is subtitled and I really want to pay attention to it. So I get about ten minutes into it and realize that being tired and sick is not the best time to watch Japanese epics. I put on some old favorites and doze in and out. Teresa comes in every fifteen minutes to check on me. She's so sweet. When she's sick I try to do the same thing but she doesn't want any one around and gets upset. I, on the other hand, will eat that attention up like a baby. When I'm sick I'm always "dying" and Teresa always puts up with my shit. One day she'll get tired of me but... not yet. Thankfully, I don't get sick very often at all. Thanks baby.

So now it's Monday again and I'm back here in Pensacola. The equipment is lost in shipping and we have nothing to do yet. I would normally be upset at this news because it will probably mean that the delay will push us into Friday instead of being done on Thursday but this week it matters not to me. I have requested time off for Friday and Tuesday and even if the equipment doesn't show up until Thursday afternoon, I'm still going home on Thursday night. Up until very recently I was the guy that would encroach upon my own plans to get the job done but I have come to accept these delays as "normal" now and if the company isn't willing to make the process any better or more efficient, why should I give up my vacation time to make the same futile attempt? Especially after I got the call last week that they were disapproving my overtime charges after I had already cleared them earlier in the week. I give a lot of my own time to the program and when I charge OT it is always approved and it is probably only one fifth the time I should be charging. Are they sure they want to piss me off? I know I'm just another faceless cog in the machine but... but nothing. That's just it. I am just another automaton. I am the tool in the traveling toolbox and what do you do when your tools wear out? You get new ones and throw the old ones away. I have no real value here at work. I may be one of the shiniest tools in the box, but I'm still only a tool. And if that's how they look at me, that's how I will act. And this tool isn't fucking up his vacations anymore. He's going to Disney World.

Yeah, I can hear you groan. "Disney World again?" Yup. Every year. We go because we like it there. Teresa enjoys different things than I do and we can hit them all in the same vacation there. Becca is always excited until we remind her that we're riding the "Tower of Terror" and she puts on a display. I don't know what she enjoys more; the ride (once she's on it) or the reaction she gets out of us when she plays the "I'm scared" part before she gets on it. Our little drama princess just loves to pick up on every little nuance from her mommy and daddy and amplify them into her own neuroses. Free-falling is a great feeling. The anticipation of the free-fall is enough to make me nuts. I get strapped into the ride and as soon as the doors shut, I get tight. I don't know if Becca picks up on this but now she's the same way, multiplied by ten. Once the ride starts the drops, it's all laughing and screaming but until that point you'd think we were torturing her. This year we paid the extra to include the water parks in the tickets. Becca has really wanted to visit them and we agreed that we should check out something new. So, we are going to the water parks the last couple of days of the trip. But only if she doesn't fuss about riding the "Tower". We'll see how well this little ransom game works.
I don't know how the speed of the trip will go. You never know until you get there. I'll never have enough time to just sit in Epcot like I want to do. I'm hoping some of the bands will be out there and I'd live to see a lot of the reenactments and such ("Off Kilter", the "British Invasion" and the Taiko drummers in particular) but waiting for them is such a time killer. There's so much to get done. Even if I lived in Orlando (NEVER!) and had the annual pass, I don't think I'd ever get tired of running over to Epcot after work and checking out the World Showcase. Maybe I would, but I'd like to put that to the test.

As I type this out (It's now Tuesday morning) I am reminded again about how I'll never live in an apartment. The people in the room above me are practicing for the ballet. Maybe playing polo? How about stampeding cattle? What the fuck is going on up there? It has been a constant rain of heavy footfalls from 6pm until 2am. There's no discernable pattern, no rhythm. Every time I get used to it, they break stride and make me take note of them again. How much time do you think I'd get if I went out to the truck, got my tools and my ladder, carved out the drywall ceiling, drilled little holes in the floor above me and stuck nails in the holes so that when they plodded along on the floor their heavy, hammer-like feet will be torn to shreds? If I first coated the nails with some Hamlet-grade poison do you think they'd convict me?

Once again, I am rightfully called out on my tendency to say things in a very flat and general manner. Let me amend them and clarify what I mean. Although I use the terms "Stupid, idiot, moron, etc..." often, I use them loosely. There are very few stupid people (although there are plenty of people with a severe common sense deficit) There are, however, people with varying degrees and areas of expertise. I know a little about many things, a lot about nothing. You for instance, might know everything there is to know about botany and when I am put to the test in that subject, I would be discovered as the fool. As someone who is very fond of knowing bits of history, I found it inconceivable (you keep using that word...) that the next wave of humans entering into decision-making society would be so completely devoid of any sense of our own history. For those of us who have been out of school a while, it is forgivable (even anticipated) that the knowledge we do not maintain and reinforce should slowly wane. I am sure that at one point in school, if you were asked those questions, you would have known the answer to most of them. But because you may not be a fan of history, many of those factoids have dropped into the dark recesses of your mind, making room for other, more useful facts like, "Where did I leave my car keys?" I can spout off innumerable little nuggets of fact, even recall a few upon questioning, but if my car keys aren't on the hook by the door, they are lost forever because I will never find them. Everyone uses their brain differently and your choice in how you employ yours or how another chooses to employ theirs, in no way implies that one is smarter than the other. If I came across as a prick, I apologize. Intelligence should never be confused with wisdom. Simply being able to regurgitate fact is never as impressive as being able to take what facts you do know and act upon them accordingly.

My original point was about how ridiculous it was that this "comedian" thought was would all fall for this as a "completely real" situation and that they didn't set this one up in the script. Maybe I was a bit vague and too sarcastic in my original post. I HATE the sanitized "wacky" and "zany" comedians. These people are so low on material that they play to the lowest levels. Morning radio shows are where it gets to be really painful to listen to but that's why I bring my own music. I don't listen to morning radio for that very reason. One really lame skit can fuck up my whole day. They insult our intelligence by playing so low and if this is your kind of comedy, be happy, you are in the majority. I am not. I prefer my comedy to be a bit more interesting. Give me George Carlin, Dennis Miller or Lewis Black. They will make me laugh but I'll also think a little bit. Hell, give me a Sam Kinison or a Bobcat Goldthwait who were never considered "cerebral" but still had better material than "get-r-done!" A gimmick alone is not funny. You have to have material. A gimmick on top of the material makes you stand out and be remembered, but if the material is no good I want no part of them.
So Jay Leno (and the lot) set up little skits like the one I talked about and swears it is true. If they did it on Saturday Night Live (which I've heard hasn't been funny in years) it may have been amusing but the part that made me want to stab him with a shish-ka-bob skewer through the left ventricle was the swearing that it was real. Does he think so little of his audience (of which I admit I am not a part of) that he thought they would fall for that? Look at the questions he asked and the answers they gave. It LOOKS like a script written by a comic that couldn't cut it in the real world. It just wasn't funny, it was insulting. Can we get Al Sharpton in on this one and push to get Jay Leno off the air? He was insulting a vast majority of Americans who, although they don't watch his show, shouldn't be insulted in that way. No, I guess Al won't give a shit on this one, he can't hear my cries for justice. His "Ruff-Ryders" CD is up too loud.

Thursday, 5-17-7

On a time schedule. When I went in for the maintenance window last night, I asked the powers that be, what I was scheduled for today. He told me to get some sleep and call him when I wake up. That's code for, "I don't know. Take your time and we'll figure somewhere to put you." So, this morning I get up about noon (after getting to sleep around 5am) and find out that I am scheduled to go back to NAS Pensacola and test the circuit that failed last night.

Of course, only on a day when I'm pressed for time. If I weren't in a hurry, I would have been out of here fifteen minutes ago. I was stupid enough to stop at a fast food place for lunch. I was on my way out and decided to stop on the way for lunch. After I got in the line, I got the phone call about getting in and out of Pensacola quickly so that I can get to Orlando tonight for another maintenance window. There are only two people they trust on this window and Heffner is in North/South Carolina so it has to be me. I'm now in a big hurry and of course now I'm stuck. I finally get to the order screen and she says the computers are down and I'll have to order at the window. No wonder it is taking so long. There are three cars in front of me and every one of them is ordering at the window. This is going to take forever but I can't go any where. I'm trapped! I can't back up and there's no lane to pull around. All I want to do is leave. No food, no waiting, I just want to be out of there and I can't. I guess that is what I get for being STUPID enough to eat fast food. The food is lousy to begin with but now I'm forced to sit and wait for it.

I just finish here at Pensacola when I hear the roar of the jets flying by. As I leave, the guy at the front desk tells me what I can already hear. The Blues are flying again, no one is permitted on the access roads until 15:00 (CST). Yeah, I know. Another free show. He tells me that they've been practicing a lot because they had to bring in a new guy on the team after the crash. I didn't have my camera with me yesterday when I watched the show from the tower but it doesn't matter. I'm out here on the open field and I'm barely getting any good shots. I'm snapping all kinds of pictures like a freaking tourist but I'm missing all of the really good, close up shots. They kind of sneak up on you at one billion miles and hour. They actually scared me a little this time. You couldn't see the jet but it sounded like an incoming bomb from a movie. Suddenly, the #3 jet shows up directly above me from out of nowhere like he's a fucking de-cloaking Romulan and then dives for the parking lot. And in a split second, he's turned 180 degrees and is climbing straight up again! The sound of the roar was incredible. Absolutely incredible. I could watch them do this all day but if I get on the road right at 4pm, I'll make it to Orlando just barely in time for the maintenance window so I want to get moving.

I make it to Orlando at 11:15. I sit and wait for the maintenance window that I am now just finding out is at 1am, not midnight. I wouldn't have worried so much had I known that. I get in there, draw up my power diagrams and finally get out of there close to 5am. Somehow between power naps at rest stops I make it home at 8am. I have driven just over 1000 miles in the past three days and I feel like crap. The weekend ahead is a full schedule and so are the next 4 or 5 weekends. I'm not even in my own head anymore.

Wednesday, 5-16-7 (4:30am)

I forgot to top off my gas tank yesterday. I didn't remember it until well after midnight. Damn. I don't really need gas, I'm at three-quarters of a tank but I didn't want to join in with these morons that think that not buying gas on one day will make a difference. I've gotten six e-mails telling me to boycott the gas stations on May 15^th. This is a stupid idea. It's like a bunch of children in a classroom all deciding to drop their book on the floor at the same time. The gas/oil companies know we will either fill up the day before or the day after. If you REALLY want to affect the price of gasoline, buy a smaller car. Walk to the store instead of driving. Buy a hybrid. Convert your diesel to a bio-diesel. That big fat SUV in your driveway is going to need a lot of gas, whether you buy it today, or tomorrow. Skipping a day shouldn't even register in the oil companies system. Simple people doing silly things to comfort their conscious and assuage their guilt. Mr. and Mrs. Smith may join you in your little boycott and they'll sleep better that night thinking to themselves that they've made a difference, but in the morning they are still waking up and driving the kids to school in the Hummer (stopping at Starbucks on the way of course...) If you can get people to refrain from buying gasoline for a whole month, that would make a difference. Get them to do it for a week and maybe it would register. But no, that would be too much of an inconvenience to their lives. People will join any cause, as long as it makes them feel better but more importantly, it has to be easy. If they are inconvenienced at all, it's too difficult and they'd rather sit and watch their reality shows on television. People suck! I know, I am a people.

Once again I sit here at work, and I wait. I did a lot of prep work to make sure that nothing goes wrong but I didn't count on the normal bullshit. I came in this morning and drove on to the base, checked my code in the gate, put my hands on the wires I needed to test tonight, met the tech I'd be working with... Everything to make sure that it went smooth tonight. I got here 30 minutes early tonight and call in only to find out that somehow, the time got changed from 0400z to 0500z. So now I sit here for another hour. I just can't win.

While I'm sitting here, the night crew is watching Jay Leno. He has a little game show segment where he supposedly takes normal people off the streets and asks them normal questions. They can't possibly be normal people. I HOPE this isn't unscripted like he says it is. I swear, I'm not making this up, these are the real questions and answers:

Q:        In 1939, Germany invaded Poland starting what war?
A:        The Cold War?
Jay:     It was a big worldwide war.
A:        WW1?

Q: Who were the Rough Riders?
A: A group of rappers headed up by DMX?

Q:        What city was buried by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius?
A:        Was it in the United States?
Jay:     No, it started with Pomp...
A:        Pomp Island?

Q: They show a picture of the Parthenon. What is this?
A: The Berlin Wall?

Q: A picture of Washington crossing the Delaware. Who is this?
A: It looks like they are getting ready for a battle... General Lee?

Q:        A picture of the Santa Maria. What is the name of this boat?
A:        The Red Cross?
Jay:     It was one of Columbus' ships.
A:        The Mayflower?
Jay:     It was the largest of the three. He had three of them...
A:        He did? Oh yeah, he discovered America in 1952.

Q:        Finish this statement: Don't throw the baby...
A:        Away?
Jay:     Don't throw the baby away with the...
A:        Garbage?

Q:        In which country is Farsi spoken?
A:        Farson?
Jay:     (Laughing) Close...
A:        Canada?
Jay:     If I ran over to you to ask you... If I RAN, over there...
A:        Ranover?

The Rough Riders question is the only one that anyone even came close to getting right away. While no one had any idea who Theodore Roosevelt was and even less of an idea there was a Spanish-American war, the "Ruff Ryders" is actually a rap gang. I know he said it was real people and completely unscripted but it couldn't be. If it is, I am very, very scared. All three of these people were fucking stupid and they were supposed to be a cross section of the average American? I'm not that dumb and neither are you.

What's worse is I'm half listening to the Conan O'Brian show now and the commercial says, "Next on Carson..." I look up and there's some dink behind a desk doing late night and using the name Carson. I don't care who he is or if it's his real name or not. There was only one late night Carson and that was Johnny. Fuck Carson Daily, he should be forced at gun point to change his name before he is given a late night show. If someone wanted to run for Chancellor of Germany and his name just happened to be Bob Hitler, he'd have to change his name. If you want a late night show and your name just happens to be Ralph Letterman, you've got to change it. Sorry, my world, my rules...

After all this prep work for my maintenance window, the system eats my lunch again. The PNOCC didn't coordinate properly and when AT&T called in, they completed the work without me. So now, the ticket is closed, the circuits are released back to the FAA and I can't touch them. I'm going back to the hotel and unless something interesting happens tomorrow, this entire week will have been for naught!

Tuesday, 5-15-7

It is my father's 59^th birthday! Happy birthday Dad!

I don't have any work to do until midnight (11pm local) tonight but I drove out to the ATCT just to make sure everything was there and ready. I also wanted to make sure I didn't have any access issues. NAS Pensacola is one of the easier bases I've been on but you never know how they might tighten up security between visits. So I did the meet and greet and everything was as it should be. I went to leave but couldn't. To get to the ATCT you have to cross the end of the runway. Today was a training day for the Blue Angels and they don't allow traffic on the access road while they are training. So the tower manager said he'd wait for a few minutes and then escort me over the runway while the jets were in air. I told him he didn't have to make any special trips, I was happy to sit and watch the show. He asked if I had seen them before and I told him that the first time I remember seeing them was when I was a kid I saw them in Savannah. I've seen them a few times since but never this close. Yeah, bummer of a day, I had to sit and watch the Blue Angels from the Air Traffic Control Tower. Poor me...

On the way back I grabbed lunch and drove into the hotel. The "poor man's mall" is on the back side of the hotel parking lot. The poor man's mall is the mall that is the broken down one. The one where half of the stores are closed and the movie theatre resorts to "dollar movies". So I saw the dollar theatre and I figured I'd check it out. When I got in there I saw a sign that said Tuesdays half price. So, I could watch a movie for $0.50. There was nothing there I was even remotely interested in seeing. "The Hills Have Eyes 2", "Firehouse Dog", "TMNT", "GhostRider", "Night At The Museum". I could part with the money, it was the time I wasn't willing to give up. I'd rather sit in the hotel and do nothing rather than see any of those movies.

So at lunch I kept getting hit in the face with the big "BREAKING NEWS" banner on the television. Jerry Falwell is in the hospital. Every two minutes they broke in like something new had happened. I kept expecting to see that he had died or that he was treated and released but no, they just kept breaking in to tell us he is in the hospital. Oversensationalizing by the media. Tell me once every twenty minutes, that would be okay. And after the first hour, don't use the "BREAKING NEWS" headline or the dramatic sound clip, you are making more of this than there is.
I'll bet some of you are waiting on me to say something rash and ugly aren't you? Well I'm not. By the time I post this, he could already be dead or he could be released from the hospital, sitting at home and enjoying a cup of coffee. First off, I wouldn't wish anyone dead. Not really. I may say it from time to time when I am really frustrated or angry, but I would never hope for his or anyone else's death.
I'm actually upset that he is going to die soon. His health is deteriorating and he is getting old. So if today was only a warning shot, he doesn't have too much longer. And I hope he is around for a long time to come. Because he is harmless now. He still holds the figurehead and the grand-poobah position but he has identified himself as a buffoon and nothing he says is taken serious anymore. Just like Jessie Jackson and Al Sharpton. When Falwell opens his mouth to speak all we hear is, "Hey guys, remember me? I'm the one that warned you against the gay Teletubbie. I'm the guy that blamed the 9-11 WTC attacks on the pagans and lesbians! I'm the guy that said God was a Republican!" Nothing he says is taken serious anymore. When he dies, who is taking his place? Pat Robertson is washed up, Ted Haggard is exposed. Who is next? Is Jerry Vines busy? Billy Graham is all but dust, Ohh, how about Fred Phelps? All of God's wacko preachers are over the hill and too far gone to pick up the slack. The next religious-right leader will be a relative unknown. Someone's idea of a good, local, homegrown preacher.
Which unknown variable is lurking in the shadows, waiting to step up and become America's next Pope? The unofficial yet unquestioned voice of God to the millions of Americans that need a good shepherd to rally them and tell them what they should be thinking, how they should be living and most importantly, who they should be hating. If the next man to step up is careful and quiet about it, he could become very powerful indeed. And if he is savvy enough to gain the power before lighting the balefires of insanity, we will all long for the days of the fat little man from Lynchburg that hollered out like an Alzheimer's patient with turrets. "Jesus was the first American!" Yeah, ok Jerry, take your medication and go lie down for a while...

Monday, 5-14-7

I'm not bitter or petty or anything but if two techs live in Jacksonville, why does one have to be In Pensacola on Monday even though there's no work being done here until Tuesday evening, but the other tech is given a travel day to get to Gainesville? And why am I never the guy going to Gainesville? Ugh! Makes no sense to me.

This weekend was a nice one. Becca and I really tried to give Teresa a nice Mother's Day weekend. In a few weeks I'll get to visit my mother. They always say that boys pick girls like their moms and girls pick boys like their dads... It's so very close in our case. No one is JUST like another but in a lot of aspects, Teresa is just like my mom. So selfless and sacrificing when it comes to their family. Neither of them knows how to relax and be pampered. I don't know if we ever truly pampered my mother when we were kids, but that's the dad's gig. I'm in charge of making sure Becca gets the credit for pampering Teresa this weekend. Happy Mother's Day Mom! I miss you!

Among our many ventures this weekend, we ended up at the zoo because Teresa loves the zoo. I saw something there that just killed me. We were walking by the monkey cage and I saw a family of a black man, a white woman and a young girl, probably eight or nine years-old. The color of the parents comes in to play only because the white woman was "acting" blacker than any black people I know. And I know some people that make Samuel L. Jackson look white. This woman had adopted all the worst of the ghetto-gangster culture. The man didn't stand out but the woman was offensive just to look at.
As we get closer, I hear the mom say, "Hey, look at the monkey". The little girl says, cute as can be, "That's not a monkey, that's a chimpanzee mommy". The mom responds with, "What ever, I don't care. Why you think you so smart?" Teresa and I play with Becca like that sometimes but I could tell that this was not playtime. You could see it in the girl's eyes. Defeat. You could sense it in the actions of the mother. I can't really describe it but the feeling was definitely one of "shut the hell up with all that book learnin". The dad just stood there and the mom just kept spouting off stereotypical phrases from the ghetto. We don't even have any ghettos here in Jacksonville.

Now what chance does this kid have? Where will she end up? As bright as she is, she's trying to explore some knowledge and interact with her parents. That little girl isn't getting any reinforcement or guidance. The only lesson I got from her mom is that ignorance is fun. This girl is obviously smart enough to pick up facts from school and apply them to real life and instead of mom working with that or even acknowledging the child in any kind of a positive way, mom just shuts her down and tells her that learning is bad for you. What will happen to this girl? I thought people were supposed to strive for more in life, try to break the cycles their parents were stuck in and try to get more, learn more, and be more. Why do some people insist on glorifying the lowest aspects of culture and making them out to be cool? I understand writing songs and making movies about these things. It's what sells. The problem is when people don't have enough ambition to live their own life and choose to live according to their favorite songs and movies. They talk like Tupac and dress like Pacino in Scarface. "Killin' and coke" How did these people get through life without knowing the line between reality and fantasy? I really enjoy the new "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies but you don't see me running around with an eye-patch and a fucking parrot.

Sunday, 5-6-7

Teresa and I had some time on Friday afternoon so we went over to visit Wade and Dianne and Lisa. I would normally just type that we went to visit "some friends" but because this visit (and more specifically Wade) is responsible for getting the website back up and running, I'll mention him by name so you know who to credit with being able to see this... Becca was over at a friend's house for the afternoon so we went visiting because we hadn't seen them in a long time. During the visit, Teresa mentions how she is really looking forward to updating the website and Wade asks why I hadn't got it working yet.

A quick aside; I know Wade does this stuff for a living and he could have had the website back up on day number two of it being down, but I don't like taking advantage of my friend's good natures. I'm not physically around enough to ask for favors with good faith enough that I will be around to return the favor if asked. I also wanted to try to solve it myself but that quickly went out the window...

So, I tell Wade my woes and he all but points and laughs at me when I tell him the domain name was registered under "Registerfly.com". He wouldn't really do that but after hearing the story, he probably should have. I guess this company is embroiled in the biggest litigation suit ever related to internet protocol. For three weeks now I've had two trouble tickets with them, neither has been responded to and their phone was alternating between constant ringing and on-hold messages. Now it's just disconnected. Wade takes pity on my ignorance and within minutes sets me up a new account and new domain name. So now I'm hosted on his servers instead of some place in Canada. The hosting company wasn't at fault for the website being down but if I'm going to pay someone to host this website, I'd prefer to throw the business to a friend rather than some stranger.

So now I just need to figure out how to make the changes. I'm not used to doing it FTP style. I guessing if you are reading this, I updated it well enough.

Saturday morning was nice. I woke up to find that the website was back up. I sat in the den and tried to start editing the page. We had made plans to go out for Cinco De Mayo that night but we were all up early and enjoying the morning. Then the knock at the door came. No one around my house answers the phone or the door. I am the only one who isn't afraid to talk to strangers. That's my job around there, kill the big bugs and to find out what the people at the door want. It's Saturday morning around 9:30 and there are two well-dressed ladies at the door, I know what they want. Sure enough, I go out on the porch and talk with them and they are Jehovah's Witnesses. They want to share a bible verse with me and I smile and tell them to go ahead. They read off a verse in Romans about taking comfort in the lord and I agreed with them that it is a very nice verse. You should have seen their eyes light up. They hooked me (or so they thought). They started in on how the world is falling into increasingly difficult times and grief is everywhere. I agreed. They followed with tying it back to taking comfort in the lord. I said, "Yup, that is a very nice thought. Even as a non-Christian, I take comfort where I can find it when I need it." The words non-Christian lit them up. You could tell the older one was ready to leave at that point but the younger one was interested and wasn't moving. "Non-Christian?" she asks? I actually correct myself and tell her it's more like ex-Christian. She says there is no such thing, that the book of John (I don't remember which chapter/verse) says that "Once God grants eternal life, neither shall they be plucked from His hand." I immediately counter with the book of Peter (I never remember chapter/verse), "For those that fall away, it is better for them to have never tasted the word of God, for the end shall be worse for those who have fallen from grace." She is befuddled. I don't think she has encountered someone like me yet. The older one has and she recognized me for who I am immediately. That is why she moved to leave when I told her I was ex-Christian. Too late, her younger counterpart has stepped in it now. The older lady moves in as relief pitcher. She brings up one of the favorites, Romans 8 (I remember this chapter but not the verse) "Neither life nor death, nothing new or old shall separate us from the love of God through the lord Jesus Christ." I smiled and retorted with "I never said I was separated from God's love, I just don't recognize the need of any messiah, Jesus or otherwise, to love god back." You could tell the younger lady wanted to hang out for a while but the older lady conveniently spotted their other group moving down the street and politely excused themselves to keep up. She left the pamphlet for me and I told her I would indeed read it. I wish they had more time to hang out, I was just beginning to have fun. I could have really thrown the young one a twister and asked, "If it is impossible to lose God's love and it is impossible to fall away from the fold once in it, please explain Lucifer to me." A good argument can get around that one but I wanted to see what she was made of. I think she could have held her own if the older lady didn't drag her away.

Thursday, 5-3-7

Tuesday was Walpurgisnacht/Mayday/Beltane and I didn't do anything elaborate for it. I made a point of observing the season in my way and I'm not sure I would have done anything different if I were home. I remember being in elementary school and making "May Baskets" for our mothers and for the local elderly people. We weaved the strips of construction paper into a basket and made tissue paper flowers to fill it. One year I remember watching another class dance the streamers around a maypole. I guess we can't do that anymore. Ah, the price of progress... It must be nice to have organized political power.

I'm sitting here waiting on my FAA contact. I was done at 10am but he won't be back here until 1pm or so. This sucks. I'm in the middle of nowhere and I can't even access the net. Oh well, back to my writings. I finally completed the expansion and bonus campaigns of WarCraft3 so I'm not playing them into the wee hours of the morning anymore. So I can't waste any time playing that, I can't waste time on the net and I'm not even tired enough to fall asleep. I spent the last hour or so playing my drum. Sometimes it's nice to be out in the middle of nowhere. Although, any second now I expect to see some "bubba-truck" pull up and try to shoot whoever was "playin those there African drums". Even in isolation I can get paranoid.

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Last Updated: 06/01/07 01:16 p