All aboard!!

I only have myself to blame. “What does Sam want for Christmas?” they asked, all innocent and grandparenty. “He says he wants a train set” I replied ignorantly and without foresight. It even seemed ok Christmas morning when he excitedly opened the train set and rejoiced that someone was actually paying attention to him when he asked for a train.

So now here it is May and I’ve discovered that you can’t really have a train set without a proper place to set up the train. Grandma and Grandpa #2 (You know who you are) complicated matters by chipping in for some train “accessories” and lo and behold we are now about $4,159.23 into this hobby of mine. Yes…my hobby. Sam just wants to turn the dial and watch the train roll around for 5 minutes and then it’s on to the next thing. I’m about 80 man hours into building Sam a table to run OUR train on and I thought I would share this adventure with you. Here is some early construction photos.

Okay, so they are both the same picture really. You get the point. Stay tuned. I’ll let you know how the lake turns out. Yes. Lake.

Joke

Why was the dyslexic kicked out of the bar?

He was spitting in the TIPS jar

Ahhh. I get him now.

I should have posted this before my last post…it would explain things.

A litter bit of this, a litter bit of that…

Ok only two things to post tonight. Late night idiotic things that probably only occur to me.

#1 – I’ve always had this fascination with the “no littering” sign. Here’s my stupid logic. One does not litter, one throws their shit on the ground, at which point it becomes litter. Where the heck did the word litter come from anyhow? I like my straightforward approach better. “Don’t throw your shit on the ground!” They probably use the word litter because they pay by the letter.

#2 – We walked by a place tonight called “The Pretzel Twister”. I remarked that is really should be called “The Dough Twister”. Why would someone twist a pretzel? It’s already twisted. See? I told you my mind is kind of whacked. I didn’t catch Jen rolling her eyes at this observation, but I’m sure it happened.

That’s really it for now. Just be happy I posted something two days in a row. I was inspired that I received a renewal notice for “Welovelarry.com” and figured I’d better step it back up. I’ll keep trying. It’s not as easy as you think to observe. Larry is visiting next week. I think I’ll ask him for some ideas.

Heat miser is coming to town

It’s getting to be that time of year here in Florida. Bizarro time. Most of the country waits until summer to have fairs, beach days, vacations to the theme parks, but in Florida we treat it like the rest of the country’s winter. Everyone waves goodbye to each other for the summer and disappears into the air conditioning. When fall rolls around we all gather back out in front of our houses and talk about what a hard summer it was. We don’t trade stories of shoveling snow or skidding our cars into ditches. We talk about when little Timmy thought it would be funny to pull the thermostat off the wall and we had to wait 4 hours before the air conditioning man could make it. We almost lost poor ma. We tell the funny story of how dad still has steering wheel marks on his hands from the third degree burns he received when he forgot to check how hot it was inside the car. Oh sure we sometimes run into each other at the super market, but instead of parkas and snow boots we walk quickly across the parking lot to avoid having our shoes melt, or picking up a quick forming melanoma. Well it’s been nice getting back to writing here, but I have to go throw some freon in the old AC. Don’t want to get caught in the scorcher of ‘10 without some planning ahead.

I don’t like spiders and snakes

I’m scared of snakes, mice, frogs, all slimy things and probably some things I don’t even remember. The kids think this is funny and so does Jen. Why do I have to be cool with everything? Why can’t a guy or a dad be freaked out by the occasional rodent or amphibian? Here are some events that have really helped cement these fears.

-  Opening the pool skimmer and finding a snake, or in Rhode Island I would find a dead mouse about once a week. It gave me the creeps to simply scoop them out of the pool with the 20 foot pole.

-  Picking up the toy snake off of my tool bench only to find out that it was the real thing. I didn’t go near the tool bench for a week. I still give it a good look before I reach for anything.

-  The other day when I was checking the pool equipment I stepped on a frog. There’s nothing like the squish of raw frog between your toes to signify that summer is just around the corner.

-  I used to run over garter snakes when mowing my parent’s lawn in Orion. The Lawn Boy spitting snake parts across the lawn will also give you lifetime heebie jeebies.

There. I wrote it. The next person who tries to hand me a cute lizard is going to get smacked…once they put it down.

Hell’s bells

I was riding my bike this week to get my daily average above 2/10ths of a mile per day, when I encountered an interesting cultural clash. Being the polite and informed bike rider that I am, I gave a friendly and safety minded “ching ching” bell ring to a couple that was walking ahead of me on the sidewalk. In Europe I found that this was meant with complete indifference, a friendly wave, or even a “here’s some more room” maneuver by the warned party. In Land O Lakes, apparently, the sound of a bicycle bell means “Look out I’m going to kill you by running over you with my bike” because that is the reaction that the lady closest to my bike at the time, had. She must have jumped 20 feet and likely peed her pants. I didn’t stick around long enough to find out, I just gave them a wave and yelled, “Sorry!”. Curiously this reminded me of a similar issue the last time I gave another walker a bell warning on the same stretch of sidewalk. Basically the same circumstances, but I could only make out a curse word or two after I zinged by. It didn’t occur to me at the time that I was the recipient of the curse words. If these people think it’s an affront or a scare tactic to have a bike bell aimed in their direction, just imagine their surprise when they get a load of the air horn I just bought. If they are going be all freaky about getting warned off I’m gonna have a little fun with them.

Ladies and gentlemen….THE DOORS!!!

I’m not sure if you are up to speed on the latest news, but a major disaster has been avoided in New York this morning. Sit down first…I don’t want anyone to get hurt when they read this. The DOORMAN strike has been narrowly averted! I know what you’re thinking. How would all of those rich, snobby people been able to get through a door if this had happened? Can you imagine the backup onto the streets as the first guy in line sat and stared at the door expecting it to open? Seriously…there are still doormen? I know I see them from time to time when staying at a large hotel, but apparently this is an actual thing. Here is a link to the article.  Doormen strike averted It might be because I grew up in rural, Midwestern America, but I can’t imagine the need for doormen. We opened our own doors. The article mentions that they take out trash, keep the lobby clean, screen the visitors, blah, blah. Here at the Carroll manse I take out the trash, keep the lobby clean and the only screening done on the visitors is, ironically, the door itself. I’m adding another job to the list of “What to look for in case of losing my current job”.

That is all I really want to be-e-e!

As usual I’m writing here because I have a beef about something. It’s also a little amusing that I have a beef about, well, beef. Well, kind of. Hot dogs. Yesterday I went over to the recreation center across the street with Sam. We thought that we would take in a little league game, grab some ball park food, and otherwise just hang out together. You can basically get Sam to do or go anywhere with the promise of one of three things. Hot dogs, playgrounds, or “I’ll buy you something”. Ever since Norway me and Sam have had a connection based on the All American staple, the hot dog. I know that sounds contradictory, but since food was so expensive in Scandinavia they have many opportunities at hot dogs or various sausage concoctions. (Just don’t use the “ketchup”) Back to my issue. Next time you buy a hot dog try to run this one by them.

Cost of package of 10 hot dogs = approx. $1.99 – 20 cents per dog.

Cost of package of 10 buns = approx $1.29 – 13 cents per dog.

Cooking, prepping, blah, blah, blah…15 cents per dog?

Less than 50 cents to put a hot dog in my grubby little hands. How much do they charge for these hot dogs? sometimes up to $2.50. Let’s just say you sell 100 hot dogs in a day and you charge $2.00 over the cost of the hot dog per frank. Boom! $200.00 profit!

When Jen reads this she will know that it is all a ploy to revisit my idea of owning a hot dog cart, which is exactly what it is. This is, sadly, my aspiration in life. Selling hot dogs. Sigh.

No soup for you!

It’s a rare opportunity that I get to respond to my readers queries, as they are many, and I don’t want everyone to get the impression that I have time to respond to all the questions that I receive. Sometimes, however, there is a compelling list of questions that I’m sure is on everyone’s mind. To this end I am responding to a list of questions posed to me from one of my Moline, Illinois readers.

Mr. Inquisitive writes,

1) What book were you reading? - My book - click here

2) What height and weight stats are on your DL ? – 5 feet 8 inches, 170 lbs. Just like is in the press guide every season.

3) How much was the total bill ? – That’s a funny one because I’ve had places give me free stuff when they screw up that was worth more than this meal. Why not give me a free meal when I screw up? - $16.47

4) Did you leave a tip ? – I left her the $5.00 that I DID have with me. I’ll bet that waitress wishes more people forgot their credit cards or cash to get 30% tips.

5) Did your consider making a run for it ? The old "dine and dash". Not only did I consider it, but I made a couple of dry runs. The first one was the old, “Maybe I left it in my car?” – I think the manager was watching me and writing down my license plate.

6) What exactly did Jen say on the phone ? – The same thing I tell her on most phone calls. “I’ve screwed this up. How do I fix it?”

7) Did you get a toy with your meal ? Closest thing to a toy was the free peanuts.

8) Did the option of doing dishes ever enter the conversation or is that a myth ? I put that idea to bed in the initial conversation. I don’t do dishes at my house and I’m not doing them for strangers.

9) Are you on any kind of medication that may have contributed to your situation ? – None of the 14 prescriptions I’m on now are purported to have any kind of negative interactions, but I forgot to add that for some reason it took me 3 hours to get home. That was also a bit unusual.

10)Is your picture now on the back side of the register with a "No Service" sticker ? – Just this

Guess who’s paying for dinner?

Get a load of this one…

I had an opportunity to sit and have a quiet meal alone this evening. The circumstances aren’t important but I found myself at a restaurant all by myself, with a couple hours to kill AND a book to read while I was there. This is essentially…a vacation. I order my food, do some reading, eat slowly, do a little more reading. The place wasn’t very crowded, so they weren’t pushing me out the door. I got to do everything on my terms. I ordered what I wanted. I didn’t have to referee the kids, everything was great…until. I soon realized I didn’t have my billfold (wallet for you Midwesterners). I had my drivers license, my health insurance card and $5.00. I decided that I was probably ok. The $5.00 could go to the waitress and my health insurance card would come in handy when they took me out back and taught me a lesson about trying to beat the check. The drivers license would be good for identification if they went too far. I assumed that stuff like this happened on occasion and wouldn’t be that big of a deal. I was embarrassed, but I was confident they could do something.  Turns out that they weren’t that accommodating. It took two managers and 3 visits from my server to come up with a plan. Surrender my drivers license and go get some money. I was to make sure I got back before closing because they needed that money to close. Eventually Jen got on the phone and did some “I am a restaurant manager” talk on them and they worked out a deal. Two reasons not to go back. One – I’ll always be “that guy”. They’ll point at me and tell the story, whispering to each other, at least in my mind. Two – Any place that can’t figure out how to get out of that situation without causing a big deal probably doesn’t deserve my money…or the money I left at home even.

Missing in action…

I disappear for weeks and no one even bothers to send a cruiser by the house to check on me? I’m tempted to make up a big old tale of woe, something along the lines of being stuck in a Florida swamp or something, but…it’s been done. I’m battling a bad case of boringitis. My family is interesting enough, but more along the lines of a “Hey Grandma, you’ll never guess what Sam did today” There are plenty of you out there that would be as impressed with a blank space than that.

Larry update – doctors visits have gone ok, nothing to report. I’ve talked to him quite a bit and he seems to be keeping busy. There is some babble about wallpaper and bathrooms and such. This is why I don’t type those things. Cardinal baseball is back. His favorite team is doing well. Jen has had zero additional heart attacks. Dullsville.

I just wanted to check in. Say hi and tell you I’m ok. Not that any of you noticed.  : )