Thoughts in Random Order

Lots of little thoughts passing thru...jotting them down...

*Struggling with 16kbps will hopefully end soon, since we'll hopefully be home much more now, the order for dsl has been placed. Not a bad price...only about $9 a month more than dialup...for the next to fastest dsl speed. They "Say" its available on our phone line...we'll see how that works. Got my fingers crossed.

*When is an addiction into the "fix it now" urgent stage? When we find we keep at it despite the negative, sometimes even horrendous consequences.

*You want to pass a truly useful law? Make Organ Donor the "default" status...and only those who exception out of it will not be organ donors. (Requiring a simple entry into the Non Donor Registry). And if it is important that you NOT be an organ donor, that is no problem, (however nobody listed in the non-donor-registry will be eligible for a donated organ should they need one...we wouldn't want to go against their deep seated beliefs now).

*Travel to and fro thru out the entire USA...it is no longer a matter of making sure each of the 48 have been visited...at this point I've lost track of how MANY times we've visited each one. What have I seen? People. People living here, there, up the hill, down in the valley, near the towns, far out in the country..little houses, big houses, campers, slums, mansions.

People all over the place, some of them hurrying...some just waiting, some oblivious to life and events happening even right behind them or in front of them. Probably most all of them thinking about their to-do list, or regretting something they've done, or wanting, dreaming, wishing, praising, griping. People.

So your little piece of life, it is yours, your turn and your space...and my turn and my space...we all get to draw whatever we want on our own etch-a-sketch, its up to us what we choose to paint on our canvas because it belongs only to us... and we don't have to copy the fancy neighbors, and we don't have to give heed to ill tempered critics...Determined not to enjoy life? So be it...but nobody out there has a right to decree your life be awful...you're a people too. So if you got somebody out there just crapping all over your existence...take them off their "pedastal" in your eyes...they , like millions of others..are just people.

*Maybe I could just live on Ritz crackers? Buttery, bready, crispy...but I AVOID buying them because if I buy a box...I'll eat the whole box within a day ...at the most 2 days.

*Healthy Alternatives always seem to offer much much less pleasure and flavor...I'm REALLY going to be ticked at some people if in my last days of life after I can no longer taste...it is discovered that what we SHOULD be eating is the food our cravings tell us to eat!

* A strange sign of our culture and era that I saw in a workplace a few weeks ago..."Smoking in designated areas only! Violation of this policy could result in progressive discipline".

*While waiting on my plane the other day, (and having several hours for that), I watched a crazy assortment of people. With my hearing loss and the accoustics in there...when people would talk it sounded like buzzing and utterings similar to those found in a SIMS game...or for you old timers...kind of like Charlie Brown's teacher sounded. As one group boarded their plane, the near to last guy on..noticed that someone had laid their newspaper down to abandon it...he turned from the counter and grabbed it up with great purpose and it seemed like that made him feel as if his life was a bit charmed with good fate. Interesting.

OK...think I got all that out of my system now, thanks.

Officer keeping up on foot even as needle passes 50mph

"In most of the United States, there is a policy of checking on any stalled vehicle on the highway when the temperatures drop down to single digits or below.

About 3 AM, one very cold morning, Trooper Allan Nixon responded to a call there was a car off the shoulder of the road outside Shattuck .

He located the car, stuck in deep snow, and with the engine still running. Pulling in behind the car with his emergency lights on, the Trooper walked to the driver's door to find an older man passed out behind the wheel with a nearly empty vodka bottle on he seat beside him.
The driver came awake when the Trooper tapped on the window.
Seeing the rotating lights in his rearview mirror, and the State Trooper standing next to his car, the man panicked.

He jerked the gearshift into 'drive' and hit the gas.
The car's speedometer was showing 20-30-40 and then 50 mph, but it was still stuck in the snow, wheels spinning.

Trooper Nixon, having a sense of humor, began running in place next to the speeding, but still stationary car.
The driver was totally freaked, thinking the Trooper was actually keeping up with him. This goes on for about 30 seconds, then the Trooper yelled, "Pull over!"
The man obeyed, turned his wheel and stopped the engine.
Needless to say, the man from Dumas, Texas was arrested, and is probably still shaking his head over the State Trooper in Oklahoma who could run 50 miles per hour."

Is it true? Well now I haven't found any substantiation for this in news searches or court records, nor have I found any reference to an OHP officer fitting this identity but nonetheless...I read it on the internet, so surely it must be wouldn't ya think?

Blown Engines and Airport Nudity

A week goes by without even logging into the internet, but that doesn't mean it was uneventful. We found ourselves up in Cedar Rapids, Ia. ready to head for home when our car "blew up". Cracked a block, blew a head gasket..whatever...the bottom line was, Oil entering the radiator, lots of very very white smoke as a strange liquid oozed onto the engine, and a really stinky heater/defroster.

Well, calling around to the whole list of rental car companies in that city didn't do any good..they were ALL out of cars. The only thing available was from "Rent a Wreck" which is pretty cool...its just an older vehicle than the name brand rental places. They were able to fix us up, but the drawback...it had to be returned to the same place. Uggh,,..so we got it, got our stuff home, and then took it back...leaving me the need to get home. Thanks to a suggestion by Marbella, Cheaptickets.com proved very helpful.

It has been years, maybe decades, since I had flown public airlines, but based on things picked up here and there in the media, going "prepared" was somewhat easier. Leaving all my keys and pocket knife and anything metal at home, having no luggage, but still feeling like Columbo...going thru from point A to B to C was gradually & successfully progressing, until...

Now before we get to the security scan, there is already some apprehension, since the LAST time I went thru one of those I got escorted into a private security interview room where they just about put me in jail for not remembering that in my carry-on was a cap pistol and holster that I had bought at the last minute for my son before heading to the Oklahoma City airport. (They didn't allow such things to be purchased in California where the boy awaited eagerly). After sweating it out, that story eventually ended up with me placing the gift in a separate box and sending it thru in the cargo hold.

...so here again as I step up to the plate, they have me put my watch and anything metal in the pan...done. Feeling smug about having to put only a watch and a pair of reading glasses in the trough, they then tell me to take off my coat and put it on the same conveyor to be scanned. I complied. But its obvious I'm kind of "Gee...am I going to have to strip?" when she makes some comments about the snaps on my overalls and says "now your shoes".

Thinking she was reading my mind I laughed and said "Yeah! Thats probably next"...but she stood there waiting. As she stood there, it slowly began to dawn on me that she MIGHT be serious? I laughed and just incredulously asked "are you SERIOUS?"...she was. (As I took those shoes off it seemed ironic that this was a SECURITY checkpoint for the safety and well being of others...even with odor eater sprays those shoes were best left on unless removed outdoors).

At this point I'm really getting concerned about my overalls, but remembering that I had boxers on was a bit comforting. After going thru the x-ray thingy they tell me I'd been selected for some closer screening. So they lead me off to the side and "pat me down" and take a closer look at my few belongings. (Someone explained to me this was because I had bought my ticket and departed within a 24 hour period).

Finally getting home and still not unpacked from unloading the rent a wreck, spending some time with little Grace and taking Mrs. Beans out for a birthday dinner, watching some episodes from the original Star Trek series...and went to bed.

So before the house cleaning and stuff organizing gets started today..finally time to catch up just a little on this computer. Quickly checking the television ..uggh...politicking and campaign trails have begun...with one candidate proudly proclaiming that "yeah" she voted for giving the president blah blah blah, but had she known then what she knows now she would NOT have"...I'm thinking, WOW...heres a chance to elect someone for president who can't see far ahead but can make definite judgements "after the fact" on how she would have done things different...Time to turn the TV off, or put in another DVD.

Tomorrow the process begins into the new job.

I FIRED 2 PEOPLE TODAY THAT WERE REBELLING

Ever since many years ago, experience has taught me to never get mad at your job and quit both in the same day. If you want to quit, fine, but do it tomorrow or a week from now...but make sure its not a spur of the minute rash decision by just making it "your policy" to never quit the same day you decide to. That has worked well for me. You can adapt it if you have the need.

But then again, honestly assess things. After over 3 years with our current employer our liason with the company was quite surprised when I told him today it was time to wrap things up...we were done. After itemizing a few things that were contributing issues to the decision, there was one item that kept appearing on my work list from time to time...that
never was something I wanted to do or enjoyed doing. So I just spoke plainly, non-contentiously....

"I've made up my mind that today was the last time I was going to do that. There is no money in it and it sucks. I'm pretty sure that this is NOT a position the company can tolerate...which is fine, perfectly understandable. Thats not up to me, but I've made a personal decision in my career/life/interests and that it just isn't going to be a part of my job anymore".

So I assured him that we would finish our current assignments, but that after this weekend we needed to come into the office and wrap this up.

There are quite a few companies we're considering at the moment, all with different variations of pluses and minuses...and having spent alot of time this past few months identifying what plus/minus was important to us, matching up with the situation that comes the closest is where my focus will be over the next several days...But in the meantime, we've got alot of work to do this weekend.

We left Albany New York earlier this afternoon, we'll be visiting Carlisle Pennsylvania this evening, North Vernon Indiana in the morning, then another town nearby, then on to Cinnaminson New Jersey for Sunday early I hope, and then McCook Illinois for Monday morning. Then stop in at our second "home" up in Iowa and "it is finished".

Though I'm tempted to take a couple months off, things are progressed enough in the decision making progress, we'll probably not be off very long at all...but life will be one step closer to being more to our liking! It's long been my belief that if life isn't like you want it to be, fix it.