...that make the world, something something. Or however Manilow worded it. Music has always been an influental part of my life ever since I was handed down an old...and I mean OLD...clock radio back when I was 11. Of course, it only got AM stations, and of all of those, only country came in clear on it. So, I became a country music fan for a while. Then while I was in Canada, I had another radio but the only station that came in decent was the oldies station. So I became a fan of that for a while. When we came home in 1990 I was in my room (which was in fact the utility room, don't ask me how I got fast-talked into giving up my room for THAT) listening to the oldies station when it hit me: I'm a teen-ager, I should be listening to something harder, edgier, so I turned the dial (yes, we had dials back then) until I found "Y95", today's top rock. And the rest is history. I think Y95 became Power 95 then it was a Spanish station, now today it's 94.9 KLTY Christian music. What a journey eh?
The following are some songs that always take me back to a time in my life when it wasn't so bad:
1. "Take Me For A Little While" by Coverdale/Page.
- This whole album is great, but this one song I always listened to whenever I was driving up to Braum's at 5:15 in the morning to work the breakfast shift. I still remember the smell of that place with the grease and the hashbrowns and pancakes. When I was there they barely had any kind of grocery items, but now it's exploded into dinners, fresh fruit, etc. I knew I didn't want to work there for the rest of my life, but I enjoyed it I guess. Once, it was 3pm and it was time for me to split and no one was getting ready to work the drive-thru, so I just left and let them worry about it. To this day I still think about if it was pandemonium that day.
2. "The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight" by REM.
-I got this for my 18th birthday (cassette tape) and just about played the heck out of it. I mentioned this earlier, how one day during senior mid-terms I only had two exams and was out of school by 10am. No car meant I had to walk home, and it was a beautiful crisp morning, and I stopped my McDonald's and picked up some breakfast and went home and enjoyed the peace. Well, this song happened to be playing while I was walking home. I love listening to this album when it's cold.
3. "Along Comes Mary" by The Association.
-I mentioned last week how one of my favourite memories was going to Toys R Us when we would come home from Canada on summer vacation and I would get some baseball cards. Well, one time this song was playing, and me being the oldies nut that I was, thought it was pretty good. I don't seem to hear it at all these days now, but when I do it always takes me back.
I'm sure there are lots of other songs that do something for me, but it's early in the morning and Emmy is informing me of the intricacies of "ICarly". Zach hasn't felt well at all this week. But he just got up and seems to be a little livlier. Wouldn't expect anything less of him.
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Saturday, June 21, 2008
"Two Snips for Mikey"
...and man, was it painful. In case you were wondering what that was all about, as of 10:23am CST on June 20, 2008, I had a vasectomial procedure (that even a word?) and now cannot have anymore kids. Now, keep in mind this was not a fly-by-night decision. Cari and I had discussed this ever since we found out Zach was a boy (which I had been wanting for a while). Now here we are, three short years later, and it has finally become a reality. And not a moment too soon. Now don't get me wrong, I love Zach and Emmy to death. But man...add one more to that mix and I may go simply mad. They are complete opposites of each other and while Emmy is more predictable, Zach is NOT. He's like a jack in the box that could go off at any minute, no matter where you are. Here's hoping he outgrows that at some point in his life. Now granted, he's only 2 1/2, but it seems like he's been two years old forever. The whole year has been a constant blur of time outs, spankings, and these guys:
Now it's not that I can't stand them (like Barney) but man, I can only take so much. Now once he likes Transformers (and hopefully there's a cartoon about them at some point), then we'll have something going.
What's funny is Emmy was such a great kid. Hardly any whining, always did what she was told. Always slept all night. Zach got up at 6:15 this morning and doesn't care who he wakes up. I know, he's only 2, but I was really looking forward to sleeping in a little this morning after what happened yesterday. One day I keep telling myself.
Now it's not that I can't stand them (like Barney) but man, I can only take so much. Now once he likes Transformers (and hopefully there's a cartoon about them at some point), then we'll have something going.
What's funny is Emmy was such a great kid. Hardly any whining, always did what she was told. Always slept all night. Zach got up at 6:15 this morning and doesn't care who he wakes up. I know, he's only 2, but I was really looking forward to sleeping in a little this morning after what happened yesterday. One day I keep telling myself.
Friday, June 13, 2008
"The Hulk...Is Coming!"
Now this one I may have to see in the theater. Didn't see the one that came out in 2003 with Eric Bana, mainly because I didn't like what people were saying about it. I tend to let reviews from people influence my decisions when it comes to movies, mainly because what I like most don't seem to be the critic's choice most of the time. Transformers in 1986 was the greatest movie ever to me back then, yet most parents didn't like it because it seemed like a 96-minute toy commercial. That and Optimus Prime dying just didn't sit well with them. But I knew there was a deeper, more symbolic meaning behind it. Now that I'm a parent, maybe I see their point. Too bad it took 22 years, right? Here's a Hulk trailer:
Cari even said she wanted to see it. I sense a date night looming!
Been at HealthMarkets for four months now. So much...and yet so little. They have this bonus program which is pretty generous but man it all hinges on one thing: audit scores. They pull three calls a week and you have to average a 95% to even be up for the lowest level. They look at the calls you take in a day and you have to have at least 55. Now that I can usually do. If I can get 63 or 70 or 77 then the bonus increases but only if I average 95% or better. If it's 97% it's great and 99% then there's some decent money. Fortunately for me I've hit 97% and up each week except for one. So the party we have in the middle of July where they give the checks to everyone will be an awesome day for me. Gotta stay sharp and never go into autopilot with this job. I wonder how long I will be here. Part of me wants to retire since they have a great 401k and pension program. Part of me wonders if something's going to happen like it did at Aegon (see December 2007 posts). I guess God gives us landmines and the gift to not only spot them but go around them.
Our icemaker in our fridge likes to take most of the ice and freeze it all together until it looks like an ice castle. Sounds neat, right? Not when you're hot and all you have to drink is a warm soda. You reach in to put some ice in a cup and all you get is a rostbitten hand from trying to grab the Ritz-Carlton of ice. So, I took the whole thing out and put it in front of my burgeoning rose bush:
Looks wild, eh? Zach and Emmy were like so impressed with how it looked. So, we put it there and went out for a couple of hours. When we came back it looked like this:
The calendar may say spring, but in Texas spring ends sometime around the middle of May. At least the roses got a nice drink.
The two Batman Dark Knight toys I bought a while back? Don't see them in stores anywhere! I wonder if they were like promotional items or something. I saw them in Walmart the first day and they were like way buried under the more kiddie toys. Kind of disappointing ones too. They all have different colours and titles like "Flight Batman" and the like. But the ones I have are darker. Much darker. Hopefully I never see them anywhere, drive up the value a bit. There are some new Transformers toys from the Animated TV series. These don't look like much, so I may not get them. But next year, when Transformers 2 comes out, I shall be ready!! Hopefully Michael Bay and co. are listening to the fans and bringing in most of the characters that were left out in the first movie. I know it's hard to make everyone happy, so we shouldn't really try. Just treat people how you want to be treated and the rest seems to work itself out.
Cari even said she wanted to see it. I sense a date night looming!
Been at HealthMarkets for four months now. So much...and yet so little. They have this bonus program which is pretty generous but man it all hinges on one thing: audit scores. They pull three calls a week and you have to average a 95% to even be up for the lowest level. They look at the calls you take in a day and you have to have at least 55. Now that I can usually do. If I can get 63 or 70 or 77 then the bonus increases but only if I average 95% or better. If it's 97% it's great and 99% then there's some decent money. Fortunately for me I've hit 97% and up each week except for one. So the party we have in the middle of July where they give the checks to everyone will be an awesome day for me. Gotta stay sharp and never go into autopilot with this job. I wonder how long I will be here. Part of me wants to retire since they have a great 401k and pension program. Part of me wonders if something's going to happen like it did at Aegon (see December 2007 posts). I guess God gives us landmines and the gift to not only spot them but go around them.
Our icemaker in our fridge likes to take most of the ice and freeze it all together until it looks like an ice castle. Sounds neat, right? Not when you're hot and all you have to drink is a warm soda. You reach in to put some ice in a cup and all you get is a rostbitten hand from trying to grab the Ritz-Carlton of ice. So, I took the whole thing out and put it in front of my burgeoning rose bush:
Looks wild, eh? Zach and Emmy were like so impressed with how it looked. So, we put it there and went out for a couple of hours. When we came back it looked like this:
The calendar may say spring, but in Texas spring ends sometime around the middle of May. At least the roses got a nice drink.
The two Batman Dark Knight toys I bought a while back? Don't see them in stores anywhere! I wonder if they were like promotional items or something. I saw them in Walmart the first day and they were like way buried under the more kiddie toys. Kind of disappointing ones too. They all have different colours and titles like "Flight Batman" and the like. But the ones I have are darker. Much darker. Hopefully I never see them anywhere, drive up the value a bit. There are some new Transformers toys from the Animated TV series. These don't look like much, so I may not get them. But next year, when Transformers 2 comes out, I shall be ready!! Hopefully Michael Bay and co. are listening to the fans and bringing in most of the characters that were left out in the first movie. I know it's hard to make everyone happy, so we shouldn't really try. Just treat people how you want to be treated and the rest seems to work itself out.
Sunday, June 08, 2008
"Let's Take a Trip..."
"Sure Mike!! I'm game! Where ya wanna go? Alaska? Hawaii?"
Well, not quite. I was thinking of a place that didn't require thousands of dollars and a passport. Let's go all the way...to the 80's/90's!
"Ehh."
(sigh) Some people ya just can't please.
When I turned 14 I got a computer for my birthday. A Tandy 1000. The premier line of home computers. However, it could only play games that needed 256K of memory or less. Which excluded about 90% of the games out there. There was one, however, that I could play, that changed the way I thought about how one was supposed to live one's life. And that game was...
Leisure Suit Larry!! If you've never heard of it, this guy (Larry) has a go-nowhere life and decides to move to a city called Lost Wages (sounds like Los Vegas yes?) so he drives there and sells his car and has only one thing on his mind: losing his virginity before midnight. What you have to do is try to convince the women in the game that you're where the party's at. Along the way you must pick up objects, buy objects and gamble in order to keep your cash flow...well, flowing. I spent hours trying to crack this and when I did I felt a real sense of accomplishment. Of course I needed a few hints along the way, but who didn't? In the summer of 1990 me and a couple of friends went to the mall (for the life of me I don't remember how we got there) and there was a sotre called Electronics Boutique that had this book about the history of the game and hints on how to beat it. So I picked it up and it was pretty entertaining. I don't remember what happened to it but I would love to have it again. It was written by Al Lowe and was mostly black on the cover with a few pictures of the women in the game. Those friends? Haven't seen them in 15 years...who knows if I ever will again. But that day was awesome.
"CBS Storybreak"
This show always seemed a little young for me, but I always seemed to have trouble reading a book all the way through, so this kind of brought it to life for me. I wished someone would repeat it somewhere. Ah well.
Baseball cards
I started collecting these in 1988 and had thousands of them. Unfortunately, 99% of them were not worth...well, anything. So, last year during my vacation, I went through all 20,000 of them and tossed the "commons". I did keep about 1,000 as they may be worth something if some of these guys get into the Hall Of Fame. When we lived in Canada, we'd come back to Texas for the summer and always found time to go to Toys R Us in Duncanville where I would buy them then go through them at my grandma's house where we stayed. What a time. I'd love to get back into it but man are they expensive today! $3 and $4 for a pack? I get a pack here and there but I don't open them. You may not know this about me, but sometimes I buy things and don't open them.
I think we're going to Hawaiian Falls today! It's a $10 million water park they opened in Mansfield. We got passes so if we go like 3 times they're paid for. We already did that I think. Or maybe today will be the 3rd. Either way, we're golden.
Did you know gas is expensive? Let's track the cost of filling up my lovely 1997 Sentra:
2001: $40 a month (bought the car then)
2008: $135 a month
In seven years the cost per month has more then tripled. We should just ban gas and force everyone to drive electric cars. I mean, it's killing the planet anyway right? All people seem to care about is finding more oil and finding more oil. We're even proposing going to Alaska and drilling in a wildlife preserve! Maybe it's just me but there can't be a limitless supply of oil in this Earth. And when we burn it, it adds to global warming. And ethanol is even worse. At least thats what Crane Pool & Schmidt brought up in an episode of Boston Legal. But the people and Shell and Exxon and whatnot seem to think the center of the Earth is made out of oil.
P.S. In case you didn't notice, I mentioned the 2 places in the beginning again! Was a coincidence really. That's all...
Well, not quite. I was thinking of a place that didn't require thousands of dollars and a passport. Let's go all the way...to the 80's/90's!
"Ehh."
(sigh) Some people ya just can't please.
When I turned 14 I got a computer for my birthday. A Tandy 1000. The premier line of home computers. However, it could only play games that needed 256K of memory or less. Which excluded about 90% of the games out there. There was one, however, that I could play, that changed the way I thought about how one was supposed to live one's life. And that game was...
Leisure Suit Larry!! If you've never heard of it, this guy (Larry) has a go-nowhere life and decides to move to a city called Lost Wages (sounds like Los Vegas yes?) so he drives there and sells his car and has only one thing on his mind: losing his virginity before midnight. What you have to do is try to convince the women in the game that you're where the party's at. Along the way you must pick up objects, buy objects and gamble in order to keep your cash flow...well, flowing. I spent hours trying to crack this and when I did I felt a real sense of accomplishment. Of course I needed a few hints along the way, but who didn't? In the summer of 1990 me and a couple of friends went to the mall (for the life of me I don't remember how we got there) and there was a sotre called Electronics Boutique that had this book about the history of the game and hints on how to beat it. So I picked it up and it was pretty entertaining. I don't remember what happened to it but I would love to have it again. It was written by Al Lowe and was mostly black on the cover with a few pictures of the women in the game. Those friends? Haven't seen them in 15 years...who knows if I ever will again. But that day was awesome.
"CBS Storybreak"
This show always seemed a little young for me, but I always seemed to have trouble reading a book all the way through, so this kind of brought it to life for me. I wished someone would repeat it somewhere. Ah well.
Baseball cards
I started collecting these in 1988 and had thousands of them. Unfortunately, 99% of them were not worth...well, anything. So, last year during my vacation, I went through all 20,000 of them and tossed the "commons". I did keep about 1,000 as they may be worth something if some of these guys get into the Hall Of Fame. When we lived in Canada, we'd come back to Texas for the summer and always found time to go to Toys R Us in Duncanville where I would buy them then go through them at my grandma's house where we stayed. What a time. I'd love to get back into it but man are they expensive today! $3 and $4 for a pack? I get a pack here and there but I don't open them. You may not know this about me, but sometimes I buy things and don't open them.
I think we're going to Hawaiian Falls today! It's a $10 million water park they opened in Mansfield. We got passes so if we go like 3 times they're paid for. We already did that I think. Or maybe today will be the 3rd. Either way, we're golden.
Did you know gas is expensive? Let's track the cost of filling up my lovely 1997 Sentra:
2001: $40 a month (bought the car then)
2008: $135 a month
In seven years the cost per month has more then tripled. We should just ban gas and force everyone to drive electric cars. I mean, it's killing the planet anyway right? All people seem to care about is finding more oil and finding more oil. We're even proposing going to Alaska and drilling in a wildlife preserve! Maybe it's just me but there can't be a limitless supply of oil in this Earth. And when we burn it, it adds to global warming. And ethanol is even worse. At least thats what Crane Pool & Schmidt brought up in an episode of Boston Legal. But the people and Shell and Exxon and whatnot seem to think the center of the Earth is made out of oil.
P.S. In case you didn't notice, I mentioned the 2 places in the beginning again! Was a coincidence really. That's all...
Wednesday, June 04, 2008
"Emily's Last Day?"
Of first grade that is!! I still cannot believe when she starts school this fall she will be in 2nd grade. This year hasn't been as much fun and as influential as it could have been I don't think. Her Kindergarten teacher really set the bar high as far as making school enjoyable for Emily and she's been looking for that since. But I think second grade will be something truly great.
I found out today that I have been moved off my 8-5 hours and will not get off until 6:30 now! Forget about trying to make plans at night now since I won't get home until almost 7 if that early. I've been told it's only temporary, so...we shall see. This is too good of a company to not put up with it for a little while. Plus, I found out yesterday that I have been named Rep Of The Month for May!! Yay me. I get a gift card to WalMart and a balloon I think. Which one do you think I am looking forward to more? ha ha
Found this at Walmart a while back:
How many remakes and repaints can they make of this guy? I've counted five so far and have four. Sometimes I think I'm getting too old to buy unopened things and whatnot. But, it soon passes.
I had a rose bush in my back yard and dug it up when I put up the new fence panels. Now it's in the front yard blooming something furious. It's always fascinating to me when you put work into something and it responds in kind. Seems like that's the only way we achieve anything in this world sometimes. I lived my life assuming someone would help me with life's challenges and someone usually did. My task is to turn that around with Zach and Emmy and teach them to count on themselves first with life's obstacles. It shall be done, oh yes...it shall be done, to quote Wayne Campbell ha ha.
Saw this and had to save it. Thanksgiving related I think:
I found out today that I have been moved off my 8-5 hours and will not get off until 6:30 now! Forget about trying to make plans at night now since I won't get home until almost 7 if that early. I've been told it's only temporary, so...we shall see. This is too good of a company to not put up with it for a little while. Plus, I found out yesterday that I have been named Rep Of The Month for May!! Yay me. I get a gift card to WalMart and a balloon I think. Which one do you think I am looking forward to more? ha ha
Found this at Walmart a while back:
How many remakes and repaints can they make of this guy? I've counted five so far and have four. Sometimes I think I'm getting too old to buy unopened things and whatnot. But, it soon passes.
I had a rose bush in my back yard and dug it up when I put up the new fence panels. Now it's in the front yard blooming something furious. It's always fascinating to me when you put work into something and it responds in kind. Seems like that's the only way we achieve anything in this world sometimes. I lived my life assuming someone would help me with life's challenges and someone usually did. My task is to turn that around with Zach and Emmy and teach them to count on themselves first with life's obstacles. It shall be done, oh yes...it shall be done, to quote Wayne Campbell ha ha.
Saw this and had to save it. Thanksgiving related I think:
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