(Note: Pictures taken by me at the Korean War Veterans Memorial in Washington DC in the fall of 2006.)
2010-05-31
Never Forget…
2010-05-27
El mentiroso! El mentiroso! Allí es llamas sobre sus pantalones!
I would like to express my gratitude to JJ of The World According to JJ in LA, who has nominated me for the Creative Writer Blogger Award. Along with the award comes some rules:
| Express gratitude to the blogger who bestowed the award unto you. | ☺ |
| Display the picture on your blog proudly. | ☺ |
| Be nice and provide a link to the person who gave it to you. | ☺ |
| Tell up to 6 outrageous lies about yourself, and at least 1 outrageous truth, or switch it around and tell 6 outrageous truths and 1 outrageous lie. | ☺ |
| Nominate 7 creative writers who might be into doing this. | ☺ |
| Post links to the seven blogs you nominate and let the owners of those blogs know. | ☺ |
Based on the wording, "Tell up to 6 outrageous lies about yourself, and at least 1 outrageous truth", I can use any combination of truths and lies about myself below, as long as I use one of each.
- I love finding the loop hole in someone else's rules, and using that to play the game my way.
- I am not allowed into "Naked Furniture" anymore. I showed them how I could stain a pair of drawers in no time, and they asked me not to ever come back.
- I prefer mustard over ketchup on my freedom fries. I normally prefer salt & pepper to mustard.
- Whenever I see 12:34 on a clock, I smile. But 11:11 doesn't have the same effect.
- I once solved a Rubic's Cube while riding a bike, no handed.
- Last month, on a crowded "L" train, a firm and perky 23 year old placed the nipple of her firm C cup in my navel, and kept brushing up against me for 3 stops. As she excited the train, I asked, "So, am I supposed to tip you?"
- I have absolutely no desire to have an iPad. "Hey Apple? Ever heard of 'PRINTING'? You got an app for that? No? So, I'm supposed to lay it down on the photocopier? Seriously? And you think it's futuristic if it can't even PRINT?!?"
As to who to tag, well, JJ took a couple that I would have done, so let's dive into the followers list:
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| Oh, and just so you know the distribution of truth to lies, or lies to truth, it's: 1.5 – 5.5 |
Fancy Schmancy @ 
~E @ 
Lisa @ 2010-05-26
Jonesing For Pain: Part II
As I explained in PART I of this little saga, "Growing up, we had family friends, the Jones. They lived on the other side of the town. Not "the other side of town". "The other side of THE town". We lived about 2.5 miles southwest of town. They lived about the same distance northeast of town. They had 3 kids that lined up in ages & genders with us, and our dad's went to high school together. That said, we didn't really hang as families a whole lot."
Let me stop here and say, that the youngest boy, Kyle, has always bugged me. He is loud. He is unfunny. He is one of those people who know you didn't like him, but will not STFU or go away. Kyle is the only person who I have ever asked if they wanted out of my car. It was moving at the time. I had no real intentions of slowing down. Sure, he was "held back" in kindergarten and ended up going to a special school for a while to deal with his hyper-active disorder. People tell me he's misunderstood.
I understand him just fine.
While I currently wish him no ill will, in fact I see he horse won at Maywood the other night, but I won't mind if our paths never cross again. So of course, he's one of my brother's best friends.
The incident I am about to describe isn't the only reason I dislike Kyle, but it sure doesn't help.
Once again, maybe 6th grade, Kyle, my brother, Geoff, and I were playing cops and robbers or war or something. We all had fake guns, and were hunting each other. I was sneaking down the back stair case in the dark, trying to out maneuver the younger kids when suddenly, Kyle somehow teleported behind me…
>KRAK-A-TAU<
Little eff'r had taken his plastic rifle and swung it with all his might, shattering the plastic rifle butt against the back of my skull, like you see in those cowboy movies.
I'm not sure if I blacked out or not, but the next thing I knew I was at the bottom of the stairs with a huge welt spurting blood.
I'm not sure I've been back inside the Jones' house since.
2010-05-24
Jonesing For Pain: Part I
[Editor's Note: If you are a bit, squeamish, brace yourself.]
Growing up, we had family friends, the Jones. They lived on the other side of the town. Not "the other side of town". "The other side of THE town". We lived about 2.5 miles southwest of town. They lived about the same distance northeast of town. They had 3 kids that lined up in ages & genders with us, and our dad's went to high school together. That said, we didn't really hang as families a whole lot.
One time, we were over there, I'm guessing I was somewhere around 6th or 7th grade, this happened.
I was walking through the living room, on their nice, brown shag carpeting when I sudden felt a stabbing pain; like a needle had had just lanced the little toe on my right foot.
That was because the eldest daughter had been doing some sewing in the living room earlier, and must have lost a straight pin.
FOUND IT!
And, to be helpful, the head must have caught in the shag carpet because it snapped off.
Just so we are all clear, there is now a straight pin, broken off in my little toe. Needless to say, I screamed. A lot.
They laid me down on the couch, and the dad, Jim, found a pair of pliers for my dad to use to try to pull it out. I thought I was in pain before, but the muscles in my little toe must have been enjoying the pain, because they clamped around that needle and wouldn't let got. I fully expected to see my little toe come off as my father tugged and pulled and twisted and yanked on the pin to no avail.
And to this day, it's still in there…
Nah, they rushed me up to the hospital ER (my only trip that I recall), and the vet doctor on call said that there were two options to relax the muscles so that the pin could be extracted, spray or a shot. I begged for the spray, considering that there was already one too many needles in my big toe as was, and didn't really need to have any more in there. The doctor said that the spray rarely worked, so he was going to go with the shot, anyway. (Then why give me the option, you fargin bastage!)
The doctor then pulled out a 37" long hypodermic needle that they must use to inject things into the heart of bull elephants or something. "Hold still, " he says. RIIIIGHT! It took 3 people to hold me down. Right up to the point that that harpoon was an inch from my toe.
I froze. Petrified.
Bang-boom-zip - Shot goes in. Muscles relax. Pin pulls out easy-as-you-please.
Should have had the stupid thing mounted.
And guess what happened the VERY NEXT TIME I WAS OVER THERE…
2010-05-21
Felony Friday
Hey, sorry I've been mostly gone recently. It's strange. Now-a-days the groom is actually expected to HELP with all the wedding plans. Between that, a fianceé who lives two time zones off, a huge on-going project at work, and the time spent hiding all the porn before she moves in, I haven't had a whole lot of time for composing blog entries. And with that clock over there –> ticking down to under 45 days, that may not change a whole lot for a bit. But please stick around. I have ideas and stories to tell. It will be worth it.
Rest assured, if I'm following you, I am reading, even if I'm not commenting like I used to.
Anyway, I feel like I'm stealing MJenk's "Totally Blowing Shit Up Tuesday". In fact, I even emailed him this video a while ago, but since he's not used it, I claim rights to post it.
Best line: "Is there a possibility that that tree will explode on launch? I think that's a minimal chance."
So, for all of you who think that throwing Christmas trees on a bonfire is fun. This proud American has dared you to up the ante.
2010-05-17
Last Sunday (Not Yesterday)
Last Sunday was Mother's Day. I did not not go home and see my own mother. I was over 2,000 miles away in Seattle. Granted, my mother wasn't at home, either. She was 450 miles away from home in Branson, MO. So there was not guilt trip on the trip. But I did call her. TWICE. And left two messages on her cell phone!
I went out with Cora's family to a quaint little restaurant filled with lace. EVERY WHERE.
Along with Cora and her daughter, we were joined by her mom, 
sister, brother-in-law, and her niece and nephew. I got to sit across from this little sweetheart.
Precious? Isn't she.
But then, after this wonderful meal, something sad happened. I had to go home.
Which meant another sad drop off @ Sea-Tac. Well, there was some kissing in the parking garage. ;-) Then, planes (Southwest), trains (CTA Orange & Red lines), and automobiles (a cabs) and the next thing I know, I'm back in my condo, on the phone, talking to Cora. Which is so surreal, since I was just talking to her face-to-face.
2010-05-14
Silver Centurion* Saturday
After such a feverish Friday, Cora and I took it a little easier on Saturday. The morning was spent out running errands. Like on Thursday & Friday, I did the driving. We figure that in July, I will need to be able to drive groups of people around, so getting a feel for the area wouldn't be a bad idea.
Saturday afternoon, we went to a matinee showing of Iron Man 2.
Cora had not seen the original Iron Man, but I gave her a quick 
rundown, and I don't think she was overly confused by that. All in all, I liked the movie, and loved all the Avengers / S.H.E.I.L.D. stuff, but then, I was a comic book collector in my 20's, so you don't have to hit me over the head with a hammer to get some of the references.
After the movie, it was time to meet up with Callista and her husband for pizza! Good food. Good conversation. They hadn't seen the movie yet, so I tried to reassure her that her dislike of Scarlett Johansson wouldn't taint the movie. (I later referred to her as "that Scarlett witch". If you don't get that joke, that means you're fairly normal.)
We got home from dinner, and joined Cora's mother and Gwen for a showing of 27 Dresses before bed at a respectable time this night of around 11:00.
* In the comics, the armor Tony uses to fight Whiplash the first time, is referred to as the "Silver Centurion" armor. But you all knew that, right.
2010-05-13
A Fairly Full Friday
Last Friday, I was out in Seattle, visiting my best gal, Cora. I'd flown in Thursday evening, and we certainly hit the ground running.
First Things First – While our first try of the morning fizzled with total equipment failure, we switched things up a little, and things started to get really HOT. And after that first try, we did it again. Yup, Cora's toaster died as she tried to toast her bagel. But we pulled out her infrequently used toaster oven (I'm a toaster oven guy) and got both of our bagels all nice and toasty. I even made Gwen's breakfast, a plain, untoasted bagel, with two slices of Colby-Jack. Cora and I drove her off at school, and then took off on our tasks for the day.
Making It Legal – Off to the courthouse to get our marriage license. I'd never done this
before, so wasn't exactly sure what to expect. We waited in the little licensing room while other people tried to get their marriage licenses and passport papers done. Note I said, "tried". The couple before I were going to get married on July 10th, one week after us. Too bad the license is only good for a month. D'oh! They were a couple of days early, so "No soup for you." And the couple who wanted to get passports for their kids for June? Yeah, you need to bring the kids in. And for June? You are going to need to pay $60 extra, EACH, to get that expedited. Ooops! But as you can see, we were successful in that mission.
Time To Celebrate! – With one of our first big task done, we then took care of a small task, getting our wedding flutes at Crate & Barrel. We think they represent us well. Modern. Quirky. Bubbly. Kinda cool.
From there, we went to The Cheesecake Factory to celebrate getting the license. We went to a Cheesecake factory on our first date.
And, like that time, Cora and I shared a desert. White chocolate and blueberry.
We also made a quick stop into Macy's so I could pick up a tie for our next appointment.
Picture Time! – After getting Gwen from school, we all got dolled up and headed out to meet our wedding photographer for our "engagement" session on the shores of Lake Washington. It was a beautiful afternoon. A little breezy, but sunny and clear. If you want to see some of the pix, please go HERE. I must warn you, they are wonderful.
This little box turtle watched us.
And this fun loving, lovely lady shot us. There was a whole lot of laughing and walking and posing and walking and more laughing.
The shoot was fun. The pix I've seen are great, and I cannot wait to see what our wedding pictures will look like.
Let's Do Some Bacon – A few weeks ago, I was talking to Cora about a meal idea I'd had. A kind of grown-up version of the tomato soup / grilled cheese sandwich mea. Instead of normal tomato soup, we went with Campbell's Select Harvest Zesty Tomato Bisque. A thicker, hardier, tasty soup. And for the "grilled cheese"? We took Pillsbury Crescent Rolls, some more of that Colby-Jack cheese, and bacon bits. (Real stuff, but from a jar, 'cuz we're lazy like that.)
They start like this:
But a quick trip thru the oven, and they come out looking like this:
And they tasted AMAZING!
Wrap It Up – And by 9:00, Cora was waking my sleeping ass up from the couch, and telling me it was bed time. Hey, that's 11:00 my time, and we packed a lot into one day.
2010-05-11
Winner! Winner! Chicken Dinner!
I finally went and done did it. I went and I done won Beckeye's Caption Contest Crotch-test #34.
I'm the FireCrotch of the month for May, and I promise to faithfully uphold all duties and responsibilities that go with the title. Not sure what those would be, mind you, but I will do my best to uphold them regardless.
Thanks, Beckeye, and now I have this song stuck in my head…
And I said 'duty'. ;-)
2010-05-06
It's An Illusion
I know I haven't been posting a whole lot of personal stuff recently, and guess what? The trend continues! I fly out to Seattle this weekend, and Cora and I will be buying our marriage license.
Now, wrap your brain around this one, borrowed from the Red Eye:
Look at the squares labeled "A" & "B". Which square is darker?
Obviously, it's a trick question. That are the same color. But your brain will refuse to see it. Want proof? Link HERE. Haul the picture into your photo editing software, and sample them.
R-120, B-120, G-120.
My job is done. I'm out of here. Have a nice weekend, and I'll catch up with y'all next week.
2010-05-04
2010-05-03
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