MIXBAG OF MUSINGS

Daddy, can I get a kiss? Hey! What about me???

Even though I've vowed to keep politics off this blog, I have to admit this is kinda cute! Diebold voting machine Ps. You can open this with Windows Media Player

I mentioned a few days ago that I was doing some projects at my house next week. My good friend Edgar (we went to junior high together), who's a project manager for a construction outfit, invited me over to one of their sites so I could pick up a few donations. They're building a fire station. He put together a makeshift desk out of some boxes and a spare door and placed it in one of the finished areas. An architect by vocation, he pulled out a paper pad and a pencil and stood across the desk from me. "So, what are the projects?" he asked. "I'm laying down a slab of concrete in the back yard. I'm putting in a new shed." He drew the square slab on his paper. Wrote down the measurements, and calculated the area. "You'll need four 2x4's, to place around it. Number 4 rebars to keep them in place. Two headed nails to hold the boards together, a wire net to pour the concrete on. Do you have a sheet of plywood to mix the concre...

Click here for mood music My friends signed me up for it a month before it happened. It was an interschollastic talent show, and it would take place in one of the city's largest theatres. More than a thousand people were expected to attend. It fell on a Sunday. Mother's Day Sunday. I was seventeen, and flat broke. I promised my mother a trophy, weeks before it happened. That would be my present to her. But as luck would have it, I caught a bad cold days before the event. By that weekend my throat was shredded. I could barely speak - everything came out in guttural bursts, fighting through the phlegm. I was entered in the soloist category. Nobody up on stage except me and my guitar. It was potentially disastrous! I went to bed early on Saturday, with a bit of an ear ache. Took a few shots of firewater before hitting the sack. I decided to postpone any final decision until the following morning. When I woke up, the house was filled with the smell of pancakes and b...

Off to the Heat game! We got Shaq, baby, we got Shaq!!!

Work weekend. Not much time to get any housework done. I had to mow the lawn between games. I'm taking next week off to get some home projects done. My dad's flying in to help me out. I've got a two page list of stuff waiting for him. Poor guy! I have to try to get the supplies this week before he arrives. We'll be too busy laying down concrete and putting in new drywall to spend too much time shopping at Home Depot. Anyway, I am accepting any and all shows of sympathy for the apparent demise of my beloved Dolphins. Whatever your hometeam woes may be, trust me, they don't compare. I am in mourning!

Christina with Aladdin & Jasmine Click here for mood music A couple of weeks ago I bought the newly released DVD version of Disney's Aladdin for my daughter. She's since seen it several times, but I hadn't a chance to view it with her until last night. I'd only seen the original release in theatres years ago when I took my nephew. Quite a good show, as I recalled. Either way, after T-ball last night, we had some dinner, got in our PJ's, brushed our teeth, read a story, then snuggled up together in bed to watch Aladdin. There's a scene in the opening fifteen minutes (true to form, I fell asleep half an hour into the film!) in which a prince calls Aladdin insignificant and worthless. Afterwards our hero is visibly upset and somewhat depressed. As is her manner, my daughter went right ahead and explained these matters to me. She said the following: "He tried to tell him he's nobody, but he thinks he's someone." I stared...

Oh, how wonderful it was to be young and stupid! However did we survive? I've been in so many car wrecks that even the wildest among you would probably gasp if I threw out a number, while vigorously shaking your head in disgust and boring through me with stern, cold eyes. Truth be told, I stole my sister's car when I was sixteen, and wrecked it. My father told me then never to bother asking him for his car keys. And I didn't. I would steal my mother's car occasionally, but never my Dad's. I hit her car against a whole bunch of stuff too, but I never totaled it. The next thing I drove was a tank. Yup. The US government grabbed a snot nosed kid who's entire driving experience was limited to racing and wrecking stolen cars and put him behind the wheel of a sixty ton M1 Abrams tank. The most important thing a person needs to know about driving a car with a manual transmission, is that all traction is lost when you put your foot on the clutch. I lear...

So, take my daughter out to see Shark Tale, buy her popcorn, candy and a soda, or stay in, catch the game and debate on TV, try to ignore her endless pleas for attention, and feed her a tuna casserole with a glass of milk? I think my mind was made up before I phrased the question, actually...

Sally's curly hair was tied back, but loosely. You could see blue and green highlights on the front, where her locks played weightlessly on both sides of her face. She always messed up her hair when she was painting, pushing it back out of her eyes with her messy hands. You'd think she was finger painting, the way her hands looked. Her study was a colorful splash of work, with a multitude of canvas strewn together across the side walls, flanked by plastic covers and broken down easels piled up in a corner. Palettes of dried oils lay randomly on the floor, meshing with the thin, dirty carpet. And the sketches. Dozens of sketches were scattered about, waiting for completion. She stared at us blankly for a moment and went back to her painting. Walter took me by the arm and guided me behind her. She was painting a field. An open field, in a prairie somewhere. There were trees and bushes, but it was mostly just open field with its contours. "Sally, it's Mick,"...

Click here for mood music It happened. I had silently hoped, when I posted my AKA on my Blogger profile, that if any of my long lost pals from other lands and other times should google me, they would find my blog. And indeed somebody has. Friends I haven't seen in nearly twenty years, and with whom I shared the kind of experiences that stay with you for life, have found me on the other side of the planet. I cannot convey the joy I've felt in hearing from them, and learning of their lives, and in exchanging pictures of our children. Our lives go in so many different directions. Those we've known and shared our hearts with keep a special place in our memories. I'll never forget the people I've loved, no matter what I do or where I go. Reconnecting after so long is a happy continuation to an old relationship. Never stop looking for old friends. You'll never make friends like them again.

Well, I finally caved in and installed Haloscan on my blog. But only after I copied all the comments I had here before, and saved them on my hard drive. I hope this makes things easier...

They were being ushered out, to the tune of "Happy Trails" and the glare of bright lights. No more last calls, and no more finishing up. "Let's go, everybody. It's time to go home," the bouncer urged. Tom was still shooting the shit with a couple of buddies, as they put their darts up in their cases. He saw her then, a beautiful woman. Long blonde hair, and immaculate face. Didn't think twice about her though, he just went about his business. As the exiting crowd was funneled toward the front door and everybody got closer to each other, he locked eyes with her. He could see her now, clearly. "Janey," he thought. "It's Janey." Then they looked away uncomfortably. They worked their way out to the wet sidewalk, greeted by the cold, dark night, still divided into the same groups. "Can I tell you something?" Richard was asking Janey, obviously drunk off his ass and getting his face in hers, "I don't me...

So my daughter knocks, then opens the bathroom door while I'm sitting on my throne, nose burried in "The shipping news." She pokes her head in and says, "Daddy?" "Mmhhmm?" I grunt. Showing me our digital camera in her little hands, she innocently asks, "Can I take your picture?" My reaction wouldn't earn me any 'Father of the Year' awards. I'm gonna start locking that damn door!

I need a new wallet. And I want a money clip. Never had one before, but lately I've thought I'd like to. The thing is, those are never the kind of things you buy for yourself. Are they? Somebody usually gives you those items for your Birthday, or Valentine's Day, Christmas, Father's day, etc. You drop the hints that you need such and such a thing, and poof! It appears. Nicely wrapped and with a red bow on it. I know I'm always listening for (usually very unsubtle) hints as to what my wife and daughter need or want. She wants perfume? A new purse? She's got it! The Lion King? A game called Elefun? No problem! But do I get the same consideration in return? Nooooooooo... I can pull out what's left of my wallet, to her total disgust, and she'll say: "Mick, you need a new wallet!" And I'll just smile sheepishly and say, "Well, there you go. Father's Day is coming up." She'll smirk knowingly and whisper conspiratorially wi...

My little slugger! Yellow uniforms this time around, folks. Doesn't she look cute? You should see her out on the field, running after every loose ball. When the ball goes past her or runs through her legs, she can't always hold back the tears. I'll stand there looking perplexed, hands on my hips, doing my best Tom Hanks impersonation, "Are you crying?" disbelieving, shaking my head indignantly, "There's no crying in baseball..." looking around at the other faces for support, "There's no crying in baseball!!!" She'll either break into a smile or run over to me and hug my leg, desperate for a little sympathy. It's gonna be a long, wonderful season!

Click here for mood music We gazed out into the open, looking at nothing in particular. Though the snow had melted, the cold air was still icy. I was wearing about five layers of clothing and I was still freezing. Johnny crushed his smoke out and put his gloves back on, over the liners. "Let's get going," he said. We'd mounted the tanks on the train earlier. It took careful maneuvering. There were barely two feet of steel on either side of the narrow bed to play with. One false move and you'd have sixty tons of armor falling over the side of the train. "Alright," I said, bouncing on my toes for feeling. "Be glad to get this shit over with." We climbed up on the flat bed and started dragging the chain hoists and heavy duty chains off the rear hull of the tank. My fingers felt like brittle, cold and raw from the cold and the friction with steel, heavily clothed though they were. "Let's latch it up, Mick," J...