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 |   On a daily basis... things that bump around in my head and make me go... hummm! |
My new blog:
This is not just a collections of personal musing but it is a place where I can vent. Talking about daily events on the local, state, and national scene is my way of letting off steam so I don't come home and kick the dog! We are all the Captain of our own "Ship of Fools." We go where the current of the times take us and we do what we must to be able to sleep at night. Now this Captain will speak his mind about that current and about the ocean on which we each sail....... ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** {image: ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** PLEASE MAIL ME YOUR VOTE FOR BLOGGER OF THE MONTH OF AUGUST. This is a shot of Me and Mel at our wedding. We were married in a simple ceremony on a deck overlooking Lake Livingston. ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** I am so proud of my new Siggy which was made by the very talented vivacious   . Thank you so very much for all the effort that went into this.** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** This was taken from the wall in the Blogville Post Office. If you see this fugitive, please do not approach, he is armed and stupid. Contact the Blogville sheriff's office at once, then take cover! ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** } ** Images For Use By Upgraded+ Only ** |
| Well the first thing I discovered about taking a vacation and not having any travel plans is that I GOTTA GET ORGINIZED! Well today I have managed to get some stuff done. I have finished some stuff for BANG and sent it off to Nada before she put out a hit on me. I have read and rebutted CC's blog...ok that wasn't that hard, I could have done that in my sleep. I also submited one of my short stories to a magazine today. Like I need more rejection! Anyway...this is the story I submited. If you haven't read it yet, please feel free to check it out.
Now I guess I need to get busy...writing....gawd, maybe I should just call Walmart and see if they will let me come back to work! LOL LOL LOL! |
| Good afternoon friends and welcome to your worse nightmare....the second blog of the day from me! We just arrived home from our meeting, at the Saltgrass, with PlannerDan and his lovely wife Linda and boy did we have a blast! When was the last time you spent three hours over a lunch? Well, that is just what we did and the time just flew by. Great food and wonderful conversation, what more could anyone ask for. Let me just say right up front that Dan is just as nice a guy in person as he seems to be here online at WDC. He is the sterotypical soft spoken Texas gentleman that books and stories have been written about. Meeting Dan's wife, Linda was really a treat for both Mel and myself. She is such a sweet lady and really funny in her own right. Personally I believe that she too should have her own Blog in here. I would LOVE to hear her version of some of Dan's adventures. I think the most pleasant aspect of the whole afternoon was meeting two people whith whom I had an instant rapport with. As I have said before, Dan and I hold many of the same values and beliefs (except for his love of the Cowboys!) and life experiences. He really does seem like my Younger, Smarter Brother...dang it! Now we did take pictures but I will not post one until Dan has had a chance to get home and download and post his own pics. He has one special one he wants to post and if I do mine first it will spoil the effect. LOL! Oh, and btw...I am all jealous and all because Dan went to the trouble of gathering his novel, Across the River, up and binding it in a very professional manner and giving that copy to MEL! WHAT AM I, CHOPPED LIVER??? He even wrote a sentiment on the cover page and signed the copy! Mel won't even let me look at the thing, she is sooo proud of her gift. I have a suspicion that Dan had taken a crash course on Sucking Up from that master of the art: CC! Well if he did, it worked, now as far as Mel is conserned, the man can do no wrong! DANG! The food was great. Mel and I had steaks...I'm not sure what Dan had, it looked a little weird and he ate it so fast I really didn't get a good look at it. Dan was mumbling something about his dang diet and having to dispose of the "evidence" quickly... Linda had some chicken tenders that looked yummy. Then Mel pulled a gun and forced us all to raid the dessert tray! It was terrible the way she forced us to eat that dang sweet stuff, but we managed...LOL LOL LOL! Ask her about her Pecan Pie with Ice Cream....hehehe! After lunch we sat around the table and talked about everything under the sun and the time just flew by. In no time at all it was time to go our seperate ways. Dan and Linda headed out onto the Freeway for their three and a half hour trip home and we turned onto our own road for our 1hour drive. No matter the miles that seperate us, from now on we know we definately have two very warm, wonderful people to call "Our Friends". We will be doing this again.....soon I hope. |
| Good Morning my Friends....This will just be a short entry this morning as we are up and bustling about getting ready for our trip to Houston. We will be meeting PlannerDan and his lovely wife Linda in about three hours now, Houston my never be the same! I promise to give a full report and possibly pictures when we return this evening.....I hope each and every one of you have a wonderful day and have at least half as much fun as I plan on having! |
| This was almost a black day on the calendar not that my missing a day would be such a big thing, its just that I guess I am a creature of habit and it bothered me to miss a day without good reason. I am sure this happens to many of you...I woke up this morning dry of anything to say here. I sat at the computer, stared at the screen and waited for a subject to present itself...nothing came. Well after a couple of hours I decided to try again...nope the well is dry for sure. I have nothing funny to say nor can I come up with anything even slightly thought provoking. Hell I can't even bring myself to slam poor CC and that is like second nature for me. Ok, in this vacuum of anything entertaining, I have decided to just let you know about me. I do this as a public service of sorts. I want any of you who have stumbled in here for the first time to KNOW what you are letting yourself in for.... I am a 56 year old male. I grew up dirt poor in rural East Texas and a lot of my beliefs today stem from that upbringing. I learned to hunt and fish, as a child, not for sport, but to augment the family food supply. By the time I was twelve I worked, after school and holidays on a neighboring ranch doing a real cowboy's job. I left school early to join the Navy where I served as a corpsman (medic)with the Marines. After a few adventures in a foregin land I came home and assumed life as a civilian. The first thing I did was obtain my GED (General Equlivancy Diploma)to take the place of the high school diploma I had foregone. I then enrolled in Sam Houston University. Unfortunately, I was married at the time with one child and one on the way and working a 40hr. week besides carrying a full college load and I just couldn't keep up the pace. So, after a year of going to class each day and working each night, I gave up on college and settled down to raise my family. I give you this ancient history to show that I am a man who has never been much more than lower middle class in my whole life. As a marginal member of the middle class I have developed much the same outlook as many others.....I am a conserative. I dislike and distrust liberals who clamor for big government to have a hand in every aspect of our lives. The very notion of a governement taking care of me "from Cradle to grave" is appalling and disgusting. I believe there is a place for Welfare. It should be for the elderly and for the infirm...those people who are phyically or mentally unable to work and feed themselves. I do not believe that just because a person is of a certain race, they have an exclusive right to be on the government Dole, or welfare. I do not believe that past injustices give anyone the right to special treatment today. I am Irish and in the 1860's Irish immigrants were hanged from light posts in New York, but that does not give me any right to special treatment today.....it's just history, get over it. Yes, I am conserative and as such, when my country is at war, I support my country and its troops. I hate the anti-war movement with a passion because I have seen first hand what effect they had in the past on a whole generation of young men who returned from a war to face these people's scorn. Many anti-war protesters today say that, even though they protest the war, they still support the troops...that's a lie. Those boys will come home and they will listen to the protester heap scorn on everything the soldier did or tried to accomplish while in harm's way.....it leaves a scar no matter how "well meaning" the protesters try to be. I don't want to see another generation messed up by you people. ************************************************** Ok, so now you know just a little bit more about me and about this blog which will always reflect the feelings and beliefs of it's author. Now you can't say you weren't warned. If you continue to come in here and read, after this blog, then welcome my friend. You don't have to agree with me, that won't make me mad, but just know that I will always speak my mind here in this place of mine. If you are a liberal you have that right....just as I have the right not to be. I can still like you...I just might not always agree with you. Oh, and I really am not "Gullible". *********************************************** Well, so much for public service blogging...I hope, the next time I sit down here to blog I won't be empty and I will be able to make a more entertaining entry. |
| Like my buddy, PlannerDan, I am looking forward to Friday. Not only am I going to finally get to meet Dan and his lovely wife Linda, but Friday will mark the first day of my vacation. Unlike my other vacations, I am not planning anything past a great lunch with Dan and then spending the rest of the vacation devoted to what I love the most...writing. I hope to finish Bygone Heart during this time. I also want to start sending out feelers to try and find an agent for my first novel, Time of Troubles. If I am able to accomplish all of this then the vacation will have been perfect. *************************************************** I would like to take a moment now to make a few personal observations about WDC. With some 15,000 registered authors, this site has a wide range of talent showcased for your reading enjoyment. There is something for everyone and some of what I have found is very good, while some of it....well let's just say, is not my cup of tea. It is the same way with the Blog page. We have some really good writers of blogs in here, many of which could probably make a good living doing weekly or daily columns for newspapers. Then, there are others... The talent of the blog writers in here range from "UGH!" to "OH WOW!" and everthing in between. The fun is discovering the good ones. To make it easier for you I have many of the good ones listed on the left side of this page, in my favs...but not all of them. I need to go in and add a few more to that list which I will do today. The thing is, I discover new talent almost every day in here. These are people who far outstrip anything I could ever do and it amazes me that each and every one of them arn't out there making big money with their talent. Personally I believe that WDC should be a required hunting ground for agents and publishers in search of new talent. I know if I were in the publishing business or an agent, I would be in here every day reading and signing some of these people up to contracts. *********************************************** Now the time has come for me to end this thing and begin to get ready for work. The next two days I work the late shift and will not get home before 11:00 p.m. but it is worth it....FRIDAY I AM FREE! on a more personal note....Dan, I forgot to ask...Do you want me to grab a table in the "no smoking" section? I don't know wither or not you and Linda would be comfortable in my normal "smoking" stall or not. Let me know buddy. OK, times up...gotta go...have a wonderful day folks and I will see you again tomorrow. |
| As many of you probably know by now CC is back home. I know most of you found this out today when you found your own blogs cluttered up with his ramblings. Well as much as it pains me to say so, I really am glad to have the goober back home safe and sound. Now we will have to WAIT for him to borrow a few hundred words so he can make another blog entry! Now I know that many of you here in BlogLand have grown to care for Bucketboy but I also know that most of you wimmen are still in the dark about what a Goofball CC really is...Dan and I knew this almost at once. So I figured I would relate a little story to you that might give you some idea why I always say...If you hang with CC long you better have good insurance! You see, while I was up there in Yankee land visiting CC there a came a point in time when he actually got me off in his truck with him...BIG MISTAKE! It happened the second day we were there. CC got a call from a guy at work. It seemed that CC's boss was out of town and his alarm at his house had been triggered. The guy wanted to know if CC would drive out there and check it out. So CC grabs me and we load up in his truck and head out to his Boss's house. The house was ten miles behind nowhere, on a lonely, one-lane dirt road. The whole trip over there CC kept up a running comentairy about how great the house was and how the boss had all kinds of neat stuff in it. I was thinking...ALARM? ALARM TRIPPED? But, I remained silent...surely the cops would be there by the time we got there.....NOT! We finally pulled up at the end of this dang driveway that was, itself, a half mile long and we came into sight of the house. The garage door was open and an old, dirty, white van was sitting in front of it with the side doors open as if someone was going to be loading it IN A HURRY! Well CC is just yakking a mile a minute and grinning and pointing out the boss's various "toys" like the private lake, the horse barn, the pool. He barrels right up behind the van....blocking it in.....and comes to a stop. CC jumps out and says "OK, lets go see what set the alarm off, shall we." "Uh, CC," I said as I climbed slowly out of the truck. "I think I SEE what set the alarm off...there is someone in the damn house!" Well as I say this he is steady walking toward the gargage door and I am following him relucantly. By the time my words register on his little pea brain we are both standing inside the silent garage. He looks at me. (BLINK) (BLINK)-CC does the eye blink thing everytime his brain goes into overload...like now when it is finally telling him...Here you are, two middle-aged, unarmed guys who just might be walking in on a home invasion and robbery. He stared at me a moment more...trying to make his mouth work while I am busilly looking around for a club to either use on a robber or clobber CC with for getting me killed. Just as CC was about to find his voice, we hear footsteps...CC squeels like a girl and moves behind me. I spot a likely weapon, a large board and wonder if I should just go ahead and hit CC first.... The footsteps got closer and then a figure walks out of the house and into the garage with us! "HI, the stranger called to us. "Me and my partner were told to come on out here and finish some work we were doing for your boss...he left the door unlocked for us, hope we didn't startle you guys." Whatever gave him that idea, could it have been CC curled up in the fetal position, sucking his thumb and calling for his mommy? Well we finally sorted out who everyone was and we found out the guy was on the up and up. We stayed there and visited with him awhile...we had to because it took some time to get CC back up on his feet again and get his dang thumb out of his mouth. The guys were nice and nothing happened...THIS TIME! But thats what I'm telling you about CC..if you hang with this guy its only a matter of time before he gets you into more trouble than Superman could handle on a good day! I can't wait to hear him spitting and sputtering and turning all red in the face, while trying to come up with a different version of this sad tale...Maybe Katlin will help him, or Hanna. LOL LOL LOL! Welcome home buddy! |
| I am home today with an unexpected day off. I woke up this morning and had a terrible headache brought on by infected sinuses but I had still planned on going in to work. I got all ready and was sitting here having a first look at overnight emails in WDC and I just kept feeling worse and worse. Finally Mel put her foot down and SUGGESTED that I call in sick for the day.....so I did. LOL! This all happened about five thirty this morning and after I called in I got undressed and went right back to bed. I didn't get up again until almost 10:30. I do feel a little better though. ********************************************** CC update: I talked to CC this morning and he was in the process of packing up to head home. His mom is home now and resting comfortably. She is still in a bit of pain and getting up out of bed is hard for her yet, but that is to be expected after her surgery. She will start her Chemo treatments next week. CC told me he would try to check in here at WDC sometime this afternoon to just say "HI". He won't have a lot of time to blog today but he promised me he had a few good stories to relate about his trip to the big city. I can't wait! ************************************************* Now for my main topic today...HOW DO YOU USE WDC? WDC is a huge site. I noticed, the last time I signed in to WDC that the site boasts of 384,035 members and 903,865 literary items! Yeah, I would say that qualifies the site as HUGE. There are many, many different interests here at WDC. We have poets, shortstory writers, novelist, pollisters, people who's passion is reviewing, people who's passion is reading and people who just write and build their own portfolio. More importantly, we have mixtures of all of these types in the site. How do you use WDC? Do you have multipule windows open at once or do you just work off one window? For example: I write short stories and novels. I also like to read the same. I also, of course, am addicted to Blogging and to Stats. Whenever I sit down at the computer and come into WDC I usually have four windows open at all times. 1. the Blog Page: Now I know I have my favorite bloggers listed on my own blog but I like to keep the big page open and refresh it from time to time to see if any of my favs have recently done a new blog. I can also check out some bloggers not yet on my fav list this way. 2. Who's Online: I keep this page open and keep refreshing it periodically to see if any of my favorite bloggers are online. This just serves to keep me "in touch" with my friends, you might say. 3.My Email: I keep this page open and check it from time to time so that I might read and answer any incoming emails in a timely manner. 4.This last window I keep open to either a chosen portfolio which I want to read, or to my own portfolio if I happen to be working in it. OR this last window might be open to "Word" if, like today, I am working on something for BANG. I have noticed that I don't do nearly as much Reviewing as I did in the beginning in here. I choose, rather, to read authors I already know and who's writing interest me. I have not even sampled the whole "Campfire" or "Interactive" thing yet. Nor have I taken a lot of time with all the varied Polls offered in WDC. It amazes me when I think about it though, I can see being here two or three years and still finding stuff to do that I have not done before. I must say though that the Stats page is one of my personal favorites. Using this page I can not only gauge the amount of traffic my port and blog has, but I can also get some idea as to when the majority of readers avail themselves of my work. Let me give you an example of another way the Stats page is helpful. A few days ago I noticed that my essay, "My Heart Remembers Heaven" garnered almost fifty views in one day. Now that gave me cause to wonder because this item usually only gets a few views a day, sometimes none at all. Suddenly it seemed a large number of people were going to it and reading it. I noticed, at once there were no new Ratings or Reviews of the item even though so many had read it that day so I surmised that most of the readers were from offsite. I then went to "full stats" for that item and checked out the links from which the readers where coming to read. This lead me to a different Website: Embraced by the Light. Someone had seen my essay and they had placed a link in this site for others to go and read it! Well I was absolutely amazed. this was the first time, that I know of, that my work was featured on a site I knew nothing about. I quickly left a "Thank you" message on their message board and I was answered just as quickly by some of their members who asked me to please leave a link to any other of my stories that might fit into their range of subject matter and interests. It would seem that I have gained something of a readership out there in Webland...Kind of exciting, I must say. So there you have it. This is how I use WDC on a daily basis. How do you use it? What is your daily routine in here? Give me a shout and let me know. |
| I have just completed reading "Across the River" by PlannerDan and I stand in complete awe at the talent of the man. He has woven a complex and compelling tale ripped, as they like to say on television, not from the headlines but rather from history. This was a true story and Dan has masterfully breathed life into a story gleaned from old papers and other documents. The story is about one of his ancestors and the fact that it was a true story lent it even more power in the telling. I am not, as a rule, a fan of the Western genre as most of those you find today are little more than modern storylines set in the old west with the hero riding a mustang rather than driving one. The characters are usually given personalities and beliefs that could mostly only be found in the product of a modern upbringing. The authors rarely give you a glimpse into the true makeup of those men and women who actually settled this great land of ours. The only two exceptions to this rule, up until now, has been Zane Grey and Louis L'lamour....now you can add one more name to that very short list....My Friend, Dan. The other side of this is that, after reading Dan's novel, I now have serious doubts that I could ever come close to the excellence he has shown in this endevaor of his. Dan has definately raised the bar for me. I can only hope to come maybe close. Thank you Dan for the privilege of reading this novel prior to its being published which I am sure will take place in the near future. For those of you who stumble in here and want to read a GOOD book.....well what are you waiting for? Get out of this silly thing and go here.....
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| I was faced with a small puzzlement this morning when I got out of bed. I got onto WDC and looked at my "Summary Stats" to see if anyone had been to my blog. Was I surprised, my blog views were at 52. Fifty two views by nine a.m? I usually average about 25 for a whole day so why was yesterday's blog any different? There were very few comments left to that blog so maybe the majority of the viewers were from off site. Like I said...a puzzlement. At this writing the views are standing at 63 so I have no idea what it will end up with tonight. Oh well, I will drop it for now and get on to today's subject... **************************************************** Contrary to what some of you might have read in another blog that will remain nameless, I am ok. Well let me qualify that...I am ok if "ok" means I am still drawing breath. It would seem that yesterday, in an effort to be a supportive and loving husband, I fell into a devious trap and almost suffered a near-death experience. Now before I get into what befell my person, let me just say that I now have irrefutable evidence that God is male while, on the other hand, Satan has to be Female! My own dear wife has proved this theory to be correct. How, you ask, well let me tell the story and you be the judge. Yesterday I was sitting here, minding my own business and working at the computer when I feel Mel approach from behind me(husbands develope that sixth sense). She stood silent for a moment watching me type then she issued a sigh. Now that was enough to set off warning bells in my head. Innocently, I turned and asked her. "What's up honey?" BIG MISTAKE! "Oh nothing," She sighed again. "I'm just gonna go in and workout...AGAIN" Brain: BREAK CONTACT! I SAY AGAIN, BREAK CONTACT. DO NOT RESPOND! Message ignored. "Aw honey, why don't you let me finish my blog and I will go work out with you and keep you company." AW SHIT! ABANDON SHIP! ABANDOND SHIP! Message ignored Well, there you have it. I ignored my better judgement and fell right into her trap. I finished up the daily blog then I walked into her lair smiling, just like a damn fly visiting the spider web! Now I figured, when we started the workout, not to go to hard on her, after all she is just a girl and I am the big, burly he-man, so I told her I really didn't need to warm up first. I would just sit at the other weight station and go along with her as she went through her normal workout. Little did I know, when I began to do the first set of leg lifts that she had it attached to what would closely approxemate the actual weight of a 1967 Volkswagon Beetle! She said she did 30 of these? Hell after 10 I felt the muscles in my thighs seperate from the bone! After I finished ten of these creatures I SUGGESTED to Mel that I might want to move onto the next exercise. I could have sworn I heard her chuckling under her breath as she lifted me bodily from my seat and helped me to the next station.... This went on for what seemed like a month though later, when I was able to raise my arm enough to check my watch, I discoved that it was only a matter of about twenty minutes or so. Finally I was done, finished, barely breathing... I crawled out of that damn death chamber and, with the help of my suddenly mirthful wife and block and tackle, I made it to my bed.....where I remained for the rest of the day. You know what was really annoying? As I lay there on my deathbed, I could hear Mel moving about the house, humming happily and, from time to time, bursting out in uncontrollable giggling! Well as bad as it was last night...this morning brought me new meaning for the word Agony. If there is a portion of my body not in pain today...I AIN'T FOUND IT YET! And she is still in that damn giggling mode.... So, my friends, there you have it. Proof positive that Satan HAS TO BE A WOMAN! |
| WAHOOO! I am off work today and tomorrow! Two days free of retail, but on the other hand that means you guys will have to put up with even more of me. You know, everyone has a different perspective on what they see, hear and read. This has always been the case, it is a part of being human I guess and being blessed/cursed with the ability to reason. Thus we have the differences between Liberal, Conservative and Moderate thinking people the world over. Take, for example, the Cindy Sheehan story that has been unfolding in Crawford, Texas at the vacation home of President Bush. Ms. Sheehan is and has been for awhile now, carrying on a vigil in front of the property demanding that the President meet with her to discuss the loss of her son in Iraq. Her son was a soldier killed in the line of duty over there. Now I have read in papers and even on other blogs, the statement: "Thank God for Cindy Sheehan. She is an example of one person making a difference." Well I have to disagree. This one lady has not made the difference. The "Difference" is being made by the Camera. It is the News Media's coverage of this rather sad event that has made the difference. They take an event and they sculpt it the way they want you to see it so as to manipulate your reaction in the direction they desire then they show it to you. You never get the whole story, just what they want you to see, nothing more. They rarely tell you, in these reports, that the President had met with Ms. Sheehan once before, not long after her son's death. But, it would seem, that the President was unable to tell her what she needed to hear, so now she is camped out on his doorstep. Now don't get me wrong, I personally feel for Ms. Sheehan. Her story is a tragic one. To loose a child under any circumstance is terrible and to loose one in combat in a foregin land is even more of a burden. But, really, what is the President supposed to do? Would you have him come out there and meet with this lady, listen to her story, then Order all soldiers out of harm's way? Would you have him cry. "OH No! We can not have people dying in a war. I must bring them all home!" I'm sorry. I am just a simple minded country boy, you can even label me gullible, but I understand that this is not the way the world works. In this country mothers have lost sons and daughters to war ever since the Revolution. They will continue to lose them as long as we are a sovereign nation. So that is how ONE camera, or in this case, many cameras, have made a "difference". They have taken one grief stricken woman's reaction to the death of her son and they have used it to stir up support for their own agenda which seems to be to be undermining a policy they don't agree with. What would have happened if this scene had played out during WW2? What if people had been as easily manipulated then? What if we had withdrawn from that conflict? Would England and France now be flying a German flag? What if this young man had been a long haul truck driver killed in an highjacking on the road, would we then be calling for the end of all trucking becuse someone might die? I'm sorry. I just can not see the sense in it all. |
| First of all I need to get a few things out of the way before I move onto the main topic of discussion... 1. I MISS FOREVER AND HER BLOG! I know she is probably having a good time but dang it....I miss her writing. 2. I also have Missage issues of Nada. Yeah, yeah, she is busier than a one legged man in a butt kicking contest. I know this, but I still miss her great indepth blogs and her pithy replies to the others of our little ring. I will just be glad when she is all settled into the new house and can throw a big cyber party for all of us. 3. I also need to update all of you on CC's mom. Mel talked to him today while I was at work and he said his mom is doing well. The tests showed the cancer was also in the small lymph nodes and not the large. This is good news because when cancer is in the small lymph nodes it tends not to spread as fast and can be treated. She is about to begin her first round of Chemo within the next few days. Oh, and CC told his mom all about us here at WDC and how we were all praying for her recovery. CC said she was amazed to think that people from all over the world knew about her trouble and were praying for her. He told Mel that his mom wanted to thank each and every one of you for your warm concerns for her health and for your prayers. 4. And finally, on a personal note....Dan, as the mayor of Torsville, I would like to hire you to do some planning....Lets discuss it over lunch at the Saltgrass, shall we. LOL LOL LOL!!! ***************************************************** Now that I got that out of me....Let's talk about our teachers. I think all of us, at one time or another, have had certain teachers who have touched out lives, sometime for the good, sometimes for the bad...sometimes just for the funny. I remember my High School English teacher, Mrs. Peace. We called her "The Dragon with the Fairy Feet." She was as ugly as five miles of bad road but she was so dang sneaky she could slip up on God and catch him unaware! She was forever catching us guys doing exactly what we were not supposed to be doing...every time she would catch us. Mrs Peace assured me in a very calm and reasonable voice one day, after catching me and a couple of my buddies trying to peek into the girls dressing room, that I was bound to end up doing a fairly long stretch in a prison system somewhere in the country. Contrary to what you may believe, I loved this woman. She was tough as nails but she never failed to bring literature alive for all her students...me included. Another one of my favorite teachers was Mrs. Mahan who was my fifth grade teacher. This is the dear lady who finally busted me. You see, from the third grade, when we first started doing book reports, I always made up my reports. I saw no reason to read some boring book then report on it. I would rather just make up my own story and do a report on that. I always got an A on those reports. The very first time, in the fifth grade, I was required to give a book report of course I did as I always did...I made up a story and reported on it. Unfortunately Mrs. Mahan was a tad sharper than my past teachers. After giving a sterling oral report on the "book" in front of the class and handing in my written report, I was shocked when the dear lady had the gall to ask me: "Where did you ever find such an interesting book David? I would love to read it." Well, hell, what could I do? I was so busted! I finally had to confess that I had made up the story myself, I even had to show her the written story which I had kept in my notebook. For my efforts I was rewarded with a personal visit to the principle's office who called my parents...I would have perferred a bullet. Setting on anything harder than a pillow was tough to do for a week after that. What about the rest of you? Do you have a favorite teacher story to share? I would love to hear them. ************************************************ Finally, I would like to leave you with a "WalMart Moment". Today I was sitting in the break room prior to going to work. I was minding my own business, reading a book and having a cup of coffee when I overheard some of my coworkers discussing the ever rising prices of gasoline. I tried to shut out the talk but unfortunatly I heard this one lady say, and this is not made up,: "You know," She told her friend sitting next to her. "If gas keeps going up it is bound to effect the shuttle missions in the future." I quickly got up and exited the breakroom and when I was safely outside I did a quick check to make sure the explosion of STUPID had not gotten on me! |
| Yesterday, at some time, a milestone was reached here in this blog and I didn't even notice until this morning. It seems that at some point yesterday I had my 3000th view of this blog. I wish we could set up our blog so that when something like this happens balloons would drop from the ceiling and confetti would fill the air. Maybe have a brass band playing in the background would be nice too. I have no idea who #3000 was but I want to thank them for stopping by and maybe they should win a toaster or something. I started blogging on March 31, 2005. So my little blog has been here for five months....3023 views at this writing... and I have learned one very important truth: People who write a DAILY column for a newspaper really have their work cut out for them. I mean, think about it, these folks manage to be funny, topical and entertaining every day of the week. How on earth do they do it? I have done "all blue" a couple of times and I figure that only about half those entries held anything worth actually reading. Some days I sit here at the computer and my mind is just EMPTY. People who do this for a living can not afford to have "empty" days...they have to be entertaining EVERY day...or at least they have to make some sort of sense. I am in awe of these folks. See how easily I stray from the main subject. I was talking about the 3000 views. I have to admit here that I am addicted to Summary Stats. I want to know how many, if any, are visiting my port and what they are reading. It lets me know that I am not just talking to myself in here. For those of you who have not discovered Summary Stats, you may find this option under "Author Tools" and I urge all of you who are curious to click on it and check out the activity within your own port. I have kept track of the views of my blog through Summary Stats and I have discovered that I usually avarage about 25 views a day for Random Thoughts. I have also noted that, for some reason, the views will spike ever so often. Take Monday for instance. On Monday I had 45 views in one day! Why did that happen? What was different about that day? These spikes will happen about once a month and I have no explaination for it. Why do some of us like to keep up with Summary Stats? Well I believe it goes with the territory of being a writer. We like to believe that someone out there actually reads what we write. We thirst for the knowledge that what we submit to the page is actually noticed by someone. I have noticed one interesting point though. In the five months I have been blogging I have tended to write less in the rest of my port. I tend to try to work on my other projects once a week, on my days off from work but sometimes I don't even do that because everyday stuff gets in the way. So, with that in mind, I have made a decision. I start one of my vacation weeks on the 28th of this month and I have decided to spend that week working mainly on my other projects, such as my novel Bygone Heart which I have neglected lately. This means that I will probably have many black days that week on the blog calendar but I see no way around it because the book has to be worked on and I will have no better time than on my vacation. So, I guess that means that you guys will get a much needed break from my daily blathering. PLease hold the applause! ********************************************** Subject change here: I recieved an email from my brother today. In it he told me he had the perfect venue for me and my digital camera....all I had to do was keep an "Open Mind". He then said that he would call later with details.....NOW I AM SKEERED! You see, every time my brother admonishes me to "keep an open mind" I end up in some bizarre adventure that usually involves bodily harm or morals charges by the local gendarmes! If I survive whatever the pervert has in mind I will dutifully report back here and let you know about it. |
| "When will I have my movie? When will it be my time to fulfill my dreams?" I read this line in a book yesterday. The character, a woman, was meeting with the man with whom she had carried on a love affair during college. Now they are both in their late forties and she is married. She refers to her life as her "movie". She is married to a successful doctor who loves her. They live a very comfortable life, her children are now grown and she has entered a midlife crisis of sorts. She has run into her old lover quite by accident and now they are sharing a dinner together and she is pouring out her heart to him. She is unfulfilled. She is restless and she wants to have her own life and not just be known as the wife of the doctor. I do not, yet, know how all this will play out because I have not finished the book but that scene got me to thinking. To me, the character was wrong when she wondered WHEN her movie would be or if it would happen. Her life, her movie was happening right then. I believe we each live our movie. It starts when we are born and the final credits roll when we die. Some of us see our movie as boring or plain and mudane but is it really? No. The struggle of each person, wither or not they succeed or fail at some point in life, is always a thing of mighty interest, of pathos and drama, sometimes high comedy or low tragedy. What we do, day in and day out is act upon the stage of life, our own movie. Each and every one is unique and interesting when viewed from the outside. That, I think, is the problem; we are too close to the story to see how it might be wonderful to someone else. Speaking personally my movie has so far, been a mixture of drama, some action with a huge amount of comedy thrown in and, finally, even a love story. I look back at my movie sometimes, like now as I sit here and type this and listen to the Irish ballads wash over me, and I see that even though I never reached the heights of some of my celliod heroes, I did ok. I can not, nor would I ever want to change the painful parts of the movie as those are things that made me who I am today....a man who is nearing the end of the epic and content with his own little film....no matter what the critics say. So, all of you out there.....as you sit down to do your daily blog don't think for one moment that your "movie" isn't interesting to the rest of us, it is. So write, my friends. Tell us of your "movie" and share with us the laughter, the heartbreak, the everyday, normal stuff you think we could care less about....we care. After all....who doesn't love a good MOVIE. |
| This will be a short Blog entry today. I just got off the phone with CC and he was filling me in on what was happening with his mother. I promised him I would let you all know what was happening so here is what I know right now. His mom underwent surgery this morning and had the bottom half of one lung removed. The doctor reported that it was, indeed, cancerious and they were now going to perform some tests on the section of lung to identify the type of cancer that she has. CC is on his way to the hospital now-it is near Washington D.C.- and he will remain up there, not only visiting mom, but trying to take care of his dad who, he said, is lost without mom there by his side. CC promised to call me tomorrow and let me know if they have, by then, found anything out about the type of Cancer she has. Hopefully it is not Small Cell Cancer which spreads like wildfire. Anything else is fairly easy to treat and get rid of over time. Anyway...that is the update on our little buddy. He did tell me to say hi to each and every one of you and to tell you how he misses you all already. "Tell em I will be back." He said to me. I told him to just consentrate on mom...we would be here when he returns and we would be waiting for more flappage! |
| It is unfortunate that people who write on the internet are not held to the same rules of libel that regular print journalist have to follow. It seems that you can find anything on the internet and often times the "Facts" these writers are trumpting have very little do do with the actual truth. The problem is that there are weak minded people out there who take every damn word they read on the Net as gospel truth. Personally I have found much of the Net to be made up of more Tableloid style "news" than anything else. You know, like those goofy magazines at the check out line that trumpet things like: Elvis Impregnates 70 year old Woman! or Space Aliens Kidnap The Joint Chiefs From the Pentagon! Most of us just laugh at these silly stories but there are those who actually BELIEVE that crap. These are the same people who run across similar stories on the Net and they belive them too. After all, they say, its on the Net it must be true! All of this is by way of background for what I found yesterday right here in the WDC Blog pages. I am always reading new bloggers, just to make sure I don't miss some really good writer out there. Well yesterday I opened this blog and was shocked. I have never, in all my life, read such a load of horse hocky anywhere, in any other medium. Now as conserned as the management in WDC is with Ratings and Content of Blogs, you would think they would be rather upset that someone is spreading such garbage freely over the pages of this site. Unfortunately, I have to assume that the first Amendment rights that cover freedom of speech also protects this idiot. Well, you know what...It really shouldn't. Maybe it really shouldn't bother me as much as it does but I guess I just love this country too much to sit around and watch some half literate fool tear into it with fantasies, lies, and distortions. Who is it? Well I won't give him the credit of mentioning his nick name here but if you want to read some of his crap just look for a blog who's tag line calls Osma Bin Laden and George Bush Brothers in Arms! I really believe people like this should not be allowed to pollute such a fine site as WDC. Does that make me a Right-Wing, reactioniary, fascist? Well....Ok, I guess I can live with that! I will admit it; there are a few things on this earth I will not allow you to mess with without getting in your face: My God, My Family, My State and My Country, in that order. So, when I read crap like is spewed by the person I was talking about I just tend to go balistic. Ok, I am offically off my soap box. You can come out now, it's safe! Have a great day my friends. Oh and if that guy I was talking about happens to read this, well buddy you can just eat poo and choke! LOL! |
| You know it's you guy's fault, all this blather about my past job adventures. You have no one to blame but yourselves. You wanted to hear about my Walmart experiences and I wrote them, or those fit to be written at least. But, in doing so I recounted some of my past job adventures before Walmart and that got me to remembering them. It was like revisiting old friends. If, that is, your old friends happened to be the Keystone Cops! The more I think about it the more I realize that no matter what field of endeavor I have pursued in my life I have always had downright strange things happen to me. It's like I am a weird happenings magnet. Ok, having bored you with this preamble, let me get right into the very first example of my lighter side of "The Follies Proletariat". When I first returned from my service in Uncle Sam's Canoe Club I joined my father in his Guide Service. I took fairly rich guys out on our lake and showed them how to catch bass. It was fun and I got to be my own boss. I would meet my clients at the Marina each morning about daylight and take them out on the lake for a day of fishing. This was a great job....in the summer, but in the winter you tended to starve to death! I had a wife and a child on the way at the time so I needed something a bit more "year around". So I took a job at one of the main Marinas on the lake. I was sort of a handyman, a jack of all trades. My boss even gave me a nifty title to go with my daily duties(sound familiar CC?). I was the Fishing Barge Maintenance Supervisor. This meant that I was in charge of EVERYTHING to do with this floating barge the owner had about four hundred yards offshore. I ferried people out to the place so they could spend the day fishing and I brought them back to shore at the end of the day. But, most importantly, I was in charge of EMPTYING OUT THE MAKESHIFT BATHROOMS ON THE BARGE! These "Bathrooms" consisted of seats with a hole in them and under the seat was a garbage can with a plastic liner in it....I came out each day and removed the plastic liner and put in a new one. Then I had to carry the full liner out to the boat, haul it to an undisclosed point in the lake and dump it. Sometimes the liner would break while I was carrying it. Yes, it was a shitty job! ************************************************ LOL! I told you that you were gonna regret this! Ok, now my next big adventure came when I got a job at the Houston Zoo, in the Reptile House. I loved this job because for the first time I actually got to deal with real life snakes and not just the human equlivant. We always had fun at work because most of us were whacked out guys anyway. We loved playing practical jokes on each other. For instance, we had this one guy who thought he was God's gift to women. He flirted with all the girls who came into the zoo. His favorite thing was when we fed the giant Anaconda. We would open the trap door in the side of the snake cage, he would slither into a holding pen and we would feed him his chicken or rabbit or whatever was on the menu that day. This guy would climb into the empty cage and clean it. Now the cage had a clear glass window where the people could look in and see the snake. So, when the girls would walk by, this guy would be crouched behind the case and would wave and talk to them and stuff. So, one day we decided to teach Romeo a lesson about paying attention to his work. We got the snake into the holding pen and let him climb into the main cage to clean it. Sure enough, a group of girls came by and he began his flirting, paying no attention to what was going on around him. Well, we waited until he was really involved in impressing the ladies....then WE RAISED THE TRAP DOOR AGIN, WITHOUT FEEDING THE HUNGRY SNAKE AND LET HIM BACK INTO THE CAGE! You should have seen that guy screaming like a little girl and scrabbling around the enclosed space, trying to stay out of the grasp of a pissed off, hungry, twenty foot long anaconda! We opened the door and yanked him out of the cage by his feet just before the snake caught him. Poor guy had to change pants but he took his job more serious from then on! ************************************************ A few years later, after having to leave my Zoo job...well I was asked to leave actually. See what happened was that one day I was asked to bring a Boa Constricter down to the childrens zoo for the kids to see. I took the snake, wrapped him around my body with his head resting on my outstreched right hand. Anyway, I got there, sit down on a rock and let the kids pet the snake...simple right? Well it was simple, until one little jerk kid decided to see if the snake was real by taking out a sharp pencil and stabbing the snake with it. The snake tighted up out of fright and it took three men to get him off me and it broke two of my ribs. I freaked and tried to feed the kid to the snake....thus the end of my Zoo career. So, a few years later I was a route salesman for RC Cola. I drove a big truck around and delivered the soft drinks to stores. My route consisted mostly of rual little mom and pop stores out in the middle of nowhere. Well I got a new little store on my route one day and the first time I called on this new account the owner directed me to the rear of the store to collect some empty bottles(this was when old bottles were saved). I walked back behind the litte store and sure enough, there was the empties all stacked up under this big old oak tree. I stared gathering them up and putting them in cases when BAM! Something hit me right in the back and two hairy arms went around my neck. Now back then I was still a little jumpy from my time in beautiful, downtown, Southeast Asia so when this thing jumped onto my back I freaked out and grabbed it by the neck and yanked it off me. When I pulled it around in front of me I discovered that I had ahold of a rather large monkey. Without even thinking I just heaved the simian as hard as I could and he bounced off the wall of the store with a very satisfying THUD. Well how was I to know the owner had a pet monkey that loved to do that to the owner..it was their little game. The monkey did survive...barely. But after the owner sued RC Cola for hurting his monkey my boss thought it best if I maybe changed professions. ********************************************* So there you have it....CRAP, SNAKES AND MONKEYS...EMPLOYMENT...MY EARLY YEARS! |
| So, a few of you have expressed interest in hearing of my sorid life in the greatest retail meat grinder ever invisioned by the feverish mind of a robber baron. Let me just say, right up front, that I have worked in retail most of my adult life. I have held a varity of jobs in this market over the years; hell I was even self employed for a time and owned my own store. I have been everything from a route salesman for RC cola to a manager of a jewelery and camera dept. at another large outlet. After each and every one of these jobs I would enter a mind set of "I never want to work retail again." It was always during one of these periods that I would try out "alternative" jobs. I was once a zoo keeper and worked in the Reptile House of the Houston Zoo. Then, another time I took on a job as a bodyguard...that was, shall we say, an interesting time. But, it seems, I was always fated to return to retail like some self-destructive moth in search of the flame. Hopefully this will be my last adventure in the world of retail, but I must admit it has been one of my most interesting in a long list of self inflicted life experiences. I have worked for Walmart for seven years now and amoung walmart employees that is considered a very long life. Walmart has a turnover reminicent of a company of riflemen in the Battle of the Bulge. I began my career with WallyWorld, as we like to call it, as a Oil Technician working in the Tire & Lube Center at the local Walmart SuperCenter. It was my job to do oil changes on cars. I started out in the "Pit" which means that when a car was pulled into one of our bays it pulled over this long grate under which I stood. Once the car was in place, I would remove the steel grate and would then reach up into the motor from the bottom and remove the oil filter and the oil plug and let the oil drain into a large vat. Then, I would replace the plug, put on new filter. Afterward, someone else, on the topside would add new oil and do whatever other service was required. This work was not carried out in a climate controlled enviroment so if it was 100 degrees outside, it was 120 in the pit. If, on the other hand, it was winter and 40 degrees outside, then it was just as cold in the pit, though I didn't have to worry about the wind. I did this for four years, working myself up out of the pit and becoming the asst. shop manager in charge of the Lube side....I didn't do tires at all, that was someone elses nightmare. After a time I grew tired of the routine and decided to move inside the store. I transfered to the Meat Market. This marked the first time I was subject to direct interaction with Walmart customers. In the shop customers were not allowed back where the work was done so we were insulated from their influnce. But the Meat dept. was a whole different ballgame. We worked out on the sales floor, right in the middle of the milling herd of shoppers. That is like playing catch with a bloody hunk of meat while swimming in shark infested waters. Store management quickly learned what I had known for a long time: I am not customer friendly! Dealing with customers in Walmart is not, as Forrest Gump would say..."Like a box of chocolates". No, we knew exactly what we would get. You see, just beneith the surface of all Walmart customers lurks a "Hannible Lecter" trying to get free. Fortunately most of these Lecter wannabes have the IQ of a retarded turnip and can be delt with fairly easily. Two customers come to mind when I think back on what I like to refer to as my "Meat Days", the Lobster Guy and the Hamburger Man. The Lobster Guy was a man who accousted me one evening and explained that he was going to have guests for dinner and he wanted five live lobsters. We keep the unfortunate crustaceans in a lage tank in the center of the Meat Dept. and were required to catch them, box them, then hand them over to the customer for their feeding pleasure, hopefully AFTER they got home. Well, this guy not only wanted five, but he demanded to have five FEMALE lobsters only, saying that female lobsters made the best eating. Well hell, all lobsters looked alike to me and I had about fifty swimming around in the tank...AND THIS TURKEY WANTED ME TO PICK OUT FIVE FEMALES???? I asked him if HE had any idea how to tell the difference and he assured me that he did. All he had to do, he said, was take a peek under their little tails. So I opened the top of the tank and took out my Lobster Catcher-a short pole with pinchers on the end-and took out the first lobster for him to inspect...IT WAS A FEMALE! I figured I got lucky but I still had four more to find. Well the next four in a row I brought out were all FEMALE! Lobster Guy was impressed. He told me that, for someone who pleaded ignorance of lobster anatomy, I had done really well chosing the right ones. "Well hell" I told him, "I just grabbed the five meanest looking lobsters in the damn tank!" The Hambuger Guy was just pitiful. I encountered him one day as he stood in front of my meat case staring at all the different cuts of meat like a lost puppy. He had this look on his face like a deer-in-the-headlights that most men get when faced with bringing something home that the wife has requested specially for some reason. I tried to ignore him but as he walked up and down in front of the case, looking more and more dejected, I just couldn't help myself...I had to go to his aid. Me: Can I help you find something sir? HG: Oh God, yes. I have been looking all over for that special meat you have for making hamburgers. My wife wants to grill tonight. Me: What? Special Meat???? You mean HAMBURGER meat? HG: YES! The spcial meat for burgers! I should have recieved some kind of award for not collapsing on the floor laughing at that point. The Hamburger Guy was standing right in front of 12 feet of display case full of packaged HAMBURGER. He thought that couldn't be right. He thought you got the meat for burgers by grinding up steak after you BOUGHT the steak. Not already ground meat........ SO I SOLD HIM TWO RIBEYE STEAKS AND TOLD HIM I WOULD GRIND THEM FOR HIM.....he was happy. I always wondered what happened to him when he got home....poor guy...HA! ************************************************ That about covers the highlights up until I moved to door greeter...maybe another day I will tell you about that experience..it was "interesting". |
| Today is my last work day for the week...Thank God! You know, it's getting harder and harder to get up and get motivated to go into work each day. The urge to run away and become a beachcomber on some faraway beach is becoming overpowering....LOL, I need a vacation really bad. I think I would feel differently if I was doing something really important, like Dan who plans cities or even CC who is now a Coporate Monkey. But, no, all I do is herd masses of mindless shopping zombies through the front doors and watch them carefully as they exit to make sure they arn't trying to slip out with a ham secreted between their thighs. Do Not Laugh....that happened once. We caught this rather caloricly challenged lady dressed in a Moo-Moo trying to get out the door with a ten pound ham held firmly between her thighs. You gotta love these people! I have gotten to the point where I do the job on automatic now. I actually "detach" from the present. My body carries out the needed formalities of the job; I greet them, I make sure they have a shopping cart, I direct them to those hard to find items and I tell them goodbye when they leave.....but my mind is not there. I do all this while my mind is somewhere else. I am mentally writing another story, I am planning a future road trip or I am just doing a "Walter Mitty" thing and imagining me being somewhere, anywhere else and doing OTHER things. Maybe if I was older it would help. I am about twenty to twenty five years younger than the normal greeters with the company and I do not fit the customers image of a Wal-Mart door greeter. They are expecting this dottering old codger who is constantly cheery to the point of being manic....THAT AIN'T ME! For example: I have some folks who walk in the door and, when I say "Good Morning." they just walk right by me without even looking at me, much less answering me. They act like I am not worth their time to reply. When that happens and they walk on past me, I call out to them...."We have a sale on Personalities today..Isle five, get one." LOL! I do love the looks on their faces when I do that. One of my best shots came one night when I had to work late. These three guys walked in the store, dressed in their L.L. Bean customed made outdoor ware and everything about them screamed "Rich Jerks on a Weekend getaway to the Lake." All three had been drinking and one of them, as they walked thru the door said to his buddies: "OH, look guys, a real life Walmart Door Greeter and he ain't even using a walker!" His buddies snickered and I smiled at him and said: "Wow, this is the first time I ever met a famous person at work." All three men looked at each other confused, they had no idea what I was talking about. "You must be famous." I said to the man who had made the crack. "Arn't you the keynote speaker at the ASSHOLE convention that's in town?" The guy looked like he had been hit in the head with a brick. He started turning all red and looked like he was about to blow up but his two buddies stopped him. They were laughing their heads off. "He got you man." One of them said. "That's the best one I have heard in a long time. You mind if I use it?" All three went on in the store and I had no more problems from them..LOL! Ok, enough of this. I am through whinning about my job. It is so unseemly after all. Now I think I will go hit the shower and get ready for another day of retail joy...THANK GOD I AM OFF TOMORROW! |
| Yesterday was a special day for me. As, some of you already know, by reading Mel's blog, that yesterday was our anniversary. I decided, the day before, that I would not do a blog on the 9th. I wanted the day to be completely Mel's day and so I figured the best way to do that was not to sit at my desk at all. This morning I have been trying to catch up on my favorite bloggers and see what I missed yesterday. I noticed, right away, that I was not the only one who was slack in their blog entries....CC...Dan??? Both these guys seem to have taken the day off as well. What's up with that?? Of course I can understand CC missing a day, after all, he was probably hiding under his couch, quivering in fear at the idea of Mavis interviewing him...the big chicken! Now Dan, on the other hand, is a different story...what happened buddy??? ************************************************* Well I guess I will tell you all about what I DID do yesterday, instead of blogging. I know, since reading Mel's blog, that she told you of our plans for the evening and she told you about what I gave her for her anniversary....NO! Not that....The other gift, the necklace! GAWD! Anyway, after she got her necklace, she asked me what I wanted, she felt bad for not having already bought me a gift. Well I told her there was nothing I needed because I ALREADY HAD EVERYTHING A MAN COULD WANT, HER LOVE! I know, I know, I am good! I figured that would spur her on to purchase some great Man-toy for me. Well, since she knew, by then, that I was planning on taking her to a real fancy restraunt, she went out and bought me this really NICE BILLFOLD! GAWD! She was sure to place a $100 bill in the billfold for when we went out to dinner...she is sooo thoughtfull! Well, after work, she picked me up at the store and we headed out to Huntsville which is about a forty minute drive. Huntsville is a college town, home of Sam Houston University, and it boasts a few very fine restraunts. I had chosen "The Plantation" to celibrate our special day. The Plantation started out life, back in 1850, as a real life plantation. It is a huge house with the giant white columns in the front and the large porch running the entire front of the building. Each room of the old house has been converted into dining rooms and each room is decorated with memorabilia from the Antibellium time. There were etchings on the walls and old family portraits. Each room had a huge, working fireplace. The walls were dark stained wood. All of this was orginal furnishings from when the house was a working plantation. Each room had no more than four or five tables so that the dining experience was guaranteed to be intimate. For our meal we enjoyed the restraunt's world class Prime Rib, served with baked potato and steamed veggies, with a side order of grilled shrimp. We took our time over dinner, talking and just enjoying the experience. Later we enjoyed some really wonderful cheese cake and fresh brewed coffee. All in all it was a very nice experience. Not just the eating, but the time spent lingering and talking about everything....It was premium "US" time. I was especally proud of the fact that, after we left, I discovered that I actually had a couple of bucks left in my deflated, new billfold...WAHOOO! After we got home Mel wanted me to go ahead and do my blog but I told her NO, that was not part of the plan. Instead we sat and watched TV together, laughing and talking....It was well worth a "Black Day" on the blog calendar. So, now I am back, the batteries recharged and ready for more adventures in bloggertude (dang CC). I hope each and every one of you had as good a day as I had yesterday. |
| Today is a lazy day as far as writing is conserned. I have just finished a really busy day at work and I am wiped out. Anyway, I think today I will just ask a few questions and discuss some unrelated subjects. I know all of you are looking forward to the next issue of B.A.N.G. and my first question deals with that fine newsletter...Now we all know that {user:Mavis Moog} is a great interviewer who really does a wonderful job on her various interviews with WDC members. My question is: How many of you would like to see a Mavis Moog interview of CC in the next edition of B.A.N.G.? I'm thinking that interviewing CC will really show just how good Mavis really is. I mean this is a challenge! Can you imagine trying to make sense of CCenese??? I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE THIS! My second Question deals with this cyber community that we seem to have formed here. Why don't we do something as a Group? Ok, here is what I was thinking about. Why don't each of us pick out a WDC member we have never read before and raid their port. Then, when each of us is done, we can use our individual blogs to Highlight and tell about the port we raided. "A BANGER RAID"! Uh...What do you all think? Now for my third question and this one has nothing to do with B.A.N.G. or really, any other site on WDC. This is purely personal. I am about to send off Time of Troubles to a publisher but before I do I would like to first give the manuscript to a professional proof reader/editor to read for any lingering mistakes. I have looked into some professional types who do this and I have recieved price quotes anywhere from $450 to $4000 dollars for the service. My question is: Have any of you availed yourselves of this type of service and if so, were you happy with the results? Also, do any of you have any thoughts on this course of action? I really would like to know what you all think before I finally decide wither or not I do this. |
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Congrats on 500 entries, and we are all looking forward to the sequel.
