Archives April 2005

I was in an area, minding my own business when I got attacked by 3 horde players. Of course it made me mad so I went back for more. I had no chance of course but I wanted to annoy them. So I would send in my demon to attack them and then run. I would cast fear on them, trying to make them run into dinosaurs that would attack them. However most of my attempts to annoy eventually resulted in my death.

Later I spotted one of the three musketeers go off on his own. I wanted revenge so I chased him which he ignored for awhile. He was 4 levels higher than me so he figured it wasn’t worth engaging me. But eventually he got tired of me being on his heels and he turned to fight. By the time he got to me I had laid 3 DOT (damage over time) spells on him. Then once he started beating on me I cast fear on him so he ran away. As he was running about wildly under the effect of my fear spell, I hit him repeatedly with other long range attacks. He came running back in and hammered on me some more before I got another fear spell off. I was down to maybe 15% health so it was do or die.

He got tired of my demon nailing him with fireballs so he took a second to kill him. That gave me just enough time to get off one more shot as he approached me. Just as he was about to strike me with what probably would have been a fatal blow, he dropped at my feet. It was funny as hell and sweet, sweet revenge for his ganking behavior.

My brother-in-law and sister-in-law arrived around noon on Saturday along with my 2 year and 6 month old neices. I hadn’t seen them in 6 months or so. The first thing that struck me was the amount of stuff that accompanied them. I remember wondering how they got all this on the plane with them. Suitcases, bags, stroller, toys, it was all jammed into the back of the Volvo station wagon they rented.

My 2 year old neice had been talking about how excited she was to see Nicki again. The last time she was down she was only 1 so she was much less threatening to Nicki. Now that Lauryn has the ability to PURSUE, Nicki wanted nothing to do with her. She would retreat and growl whenever my neice would approach her. The huge mountain of supplies they brought with landed mostly on the kitchen counter and reproduced from there. Having 2 children in the house produces a dramatic and instantaneous change in the environment.

After the initial excitement died down we started talking about dinner ideas. We decided to go to the new Cheesecake Factory that opened up in the past few months. It was a saturday at 6:30 in the evening so we knew it would be a substantial wait. When we arrived we saw lots of people mulling around outside, confirming we would have time to kill. When we gave our names they said it would a 65 to 85 minute wait. Woah. They had so many people waiting that they said we should come back in 15 minutes to pick up the buzzer, they had none. We came up with a plan to make it easier. We sent the women with the kids over to the mall while my brother-in-law and I would drink at the bar, works for me. Our bartender looked like she was 16. We drank and watched the Masters at the bar for maybe 45 minutes. I had just finished my second 22 ounce beer when the buzzer went off. Ah damn, the women weren’t back yet. So I hurriedly called them on my cell phone to get them back. Luckily they were already on their way. Even though the restaurant was full, it had a very large seating capacity so they were able to keep the bodies moving. The idea of under promising and over delivering on wait times is a good thing. I really liked the place, the food was great and the cheesecake for desert was even better. Of course after eating like that I felt like a glutton. Throughout the dinner we of course had 95% of our attention directed towards the kids. Either entertaining the 2 year old or picking stuff off the floor the 6 month old would throw repeatedly. By the time we finished up and got home it was close to 10. I was very tired. A half day of kids was enough to drain me.

On Sunday we decided to go to the local zoo. I hadn’t been there in many years for whatever reason. We got there early, hoping to avoid crowds, which we did. It was really nice. The zoo here is unique in it’s setting. The trees and plants are as interesting as the animals. It is really a cool place to spend a day. As we walked around I pocketed seeds that dropped off various trees in hopes of planting them and someday having my own bit of paradise in my own yard. We saw the gambit of animals from alligators to tigers. We helped feed the kangaroos and watched them feed the gators. We spent around 4 hours there, a perfect amount of time. The kids had some grumpy spells thrown in there. but nothing too severe.

When we got back we were all kinda pooped. The kids were asleep. So I relaxed out in the pool and we decided to eat leftovers at home. The evening was spent entertaining the kids while the TV was on. I snuck away for a bit and played some WoW to relax. Tonight we are doing another dinner and they fly out tomorrow morning.

Everytime I am around people with young kids it makes me imagine transposing myself into their shoes and thinking about how I would handle such things. It seems a bit overwhelming, a lot of sacrificing of one’s self occurs and the minimum 18 year commitment is more than a little daunting. However there are aspects of it that are appealing. The bond between a child and their parents is unique and something that can’t be accomplished in any other way. But do I need to contribute to a world population that is already out of control? Do I need to bring a kid into a world that is as rotten as this one is? The answer is a resounding “I don’t know”

Yesterday I flipped on the radio at home while I was making our lunches for work and I heard music. Hmm that’s odd, it’s after 6am, where is Stern? The music continued and I dismissed it as a glitch. We hop in the car, flip on Krock, music, no Stern. WTF? Oh well I flipped on the satellite radio and listened to music (even though I really don’t like doing that in the morning) I get to work, flip on the radio, music, no Stern and then I hear a station annoucement. It basically said the contract with the Stern show expired Wednesday and Howard decided to not renew. What the hell??????? I was pissed. First I was pissed that they knew this was coming and did not say anything and just let us run into the wall. Second I knew this was BS and it was the station that decided to not renew because Stern is going to Sirius.

I heard the announcement come on time and again, each time I got increasingly annoyed at the prospect of being Sternless for 8 months. Eventually I responded as you would expect, the emails started flying. First I sent one to the on air jock, asking him why he was lying about Stern’s absence and chastised him for reading such a phony sounding response from management. Then I took aim at the program director. Again I challenged him to defend the move and told him that instead of enjoying strong ratings for the next 8 months he instead caused me to boycott his station forever.

Evidently I made enough impression to get a response. The PD told me that the station did want to renew Stern for the last 8 months, however Stern was not interested. The reason he was not interested was because the station owners also own the Miami station that has butchered and censored Stern’s show endlessly. So as retaliation, Stern told our local station, owned by the same group to go to hell.

Well I felt bad for coming down so hard on them and apologized for doing so but I was still really bummed about it. This morning on my drive in I am channel changing like mad, trying to find something to fill the void, the NFL channel, Fox News, or music channels all left me empty. Damn this is gonna suck.

My brother and sister in-law arrive tomorrow for a quick hitting visit. I fired up the pool heater and expect to have a busy but fun weekend with them.

Todays World of Warcraft term:

gank

– To attack an opposing player when there is little to no chance that you will lose. For example, attacking a player when he is engaged with a monster and is already at a low health level.

– To attack a player that is a much lower level than yourself, posing no challenge to your ability while causing undo grief to the target player.

– to be a cheap ass loser

When I was a kid I always had a fascination with moving vehicles. The first recollection I have of my own wheels was the famous Big Wheel. The Big Wheel was a solid performer and was easy to ride. Mine was equipped with the optional piece of metal that bounced off the rear wheel to make a cool click click click sound as you were riding. Big wheels did have some draw backs. If you really tried to pedal fast with them, there was a good chance the large plastic wheel would just start spinning in place, especially once the wheel started to wear a bit. Also if you were going downhill, you had to pull your feet off the pedals and hold your legs awkwardly up in the air because once the big wheel picked up speed there was no way your feet could stay on the madly rotating pedals. I had several instances where while “freewheeling” down a hill, a loose shoelace would get ensnared in the run away pedals instantly attaching my foot to the front wheel in a manner that was sometimes a little painful. I am a bit fuzzy on what the braking system was on the big wheel but I think it was a simple lever that grinded against a back wheel.

We had a standard course which started up at the garage, then about 200 feet down the rough asphalt driveway we would throw it left 200 degrees onto a grassy hill behind the shed. If we were overly agressive on that turn it was very easy to roll right into the shed. If we felt really daring we would go straight down a steeper hill with little thought of how to stop. The object was to hit the narrow gulley between the outhouse and the workshop. A miscalculation meant either a painful impact or an equally painful dive off the vehicle to avoid the impact.

After the big wheel I moved up to the corvette of plastic, kid powered vehicles, the Green Machine. The Green Machine was very unique. It had a large front wheel like the Big Wheel but it was fixed in place and could not be turned. Instead the steering was done by an innovative rear wheel getup that was controlled by 2 levers. Steering with the Green Machine was much less precise than the Big Wheel. It was extremely easy to oversteer the unit and wind up in a ditch when you were simply trying to make a slight turn. However in straight line performance, the Green Machine was a hands down winner. However the best part about the green machine was the twitchy rear steering made it a natural skidding machine. You could throw the levers and instantly send the Green Machine into a wicked power slide. I loved that thing.

Before I graduated to bicycles there were a couple other gravity powered machines I was the proud owner of. One was a homemade soap box derby type of vehicle my dad made for me. It was done from plans and it was an impressive contraption. The steering was done with a conventional steering wheel that controlled the wheels by spinning wash line that was carefully wrapped around a rod attached to the front wheels. The only drawback was as the rope stretched the steering would get sloppy so it required regular maintenance. Unlike the Big Wheel and Green Machine, downhill travel was easy and fast, no pedals to contend with. However the draw back with a vehicle like this was the lack of any self propulsion so every fun trip down a hill, required an equally demanding push back up the hill.

The other gravity powered vehicle was an old lawn tractor that we had laying around. It was basically complete except it didn’t have the mower or engine anymore. This was sort of cool because the steering was car like. However the remnants of a transmission caused resistance when it rolled so you only got good performance down steeper hills. This was also very heavy so the push back up was enough of a pain that the tractor saw limited use in my childhood motoring.

Eventually I graduated to bikes and when I was old enough my dad let me drive the big tractor we had. That tractor was my car, or at least I thought it was. I remember going all out in that thing, maybe 10 mph and thinking it was quick. I took several extended trips out on the road with it. One time I bet I took it on at least a 6 mile loop. It was a blast.

Why in the world would I bring this up? No reason, just was running through my mind. If I ever have a kid they will own a Green Machine. 🙂

This work week started off in an odd fashion. As I pulled into the parking lot and was parking, I glanced up and saw 2 of my coworkers stop abruptly in the parking lot right next to a white malibu driven by an old lady. After looking further, it was obvious the one woman was upset. I thought to myself, “That old lady didn’t hit her….” Yep. Evidently the old broad bumped into my co-worker as she drove past, taking no heed to the basic , pedestrians have the right of way, principal. I got out and went over. My co-worker was crying but not so much because of the pain from getting bumped by the car but the shock of it all. She was a step away from much more serious damage. We told the old woman to park, which she did. As she pulled into a spot I immediately noticed the entire hood was covered in words that were scribbled on by black magic marker. What the hell?

We escorted our co-worker back to her car and sat her down as she was shaking. The old woman crawls out of her car and pulls out her walker and shuffles over. I figured she would be saying something like “I’m really sorry.” or “I couldn’t see because the sun was in my eyes” but no instead we got “It’s not my fault, she walked into my car.” I chastised the woman and told her that people don’t walk into cars and in a parking lot you always yield to pedestrians, there was no excuse. She kept blabbing on about it’s not her fault, she walked into the door… We finally just asked her to sit in her car and wait for the deputies that I called to show up to sort it out.

While we were waiting, I glanced at the hood to see if I could read it. Some of the magic marker was sunfaded, but from what I could make out it said something about a bank spending her social security money. I found out later that this woman has a few screws loose (no kidding) and regularly parks her wheelchair outside the courthouse with signs denouncing some local judge that somehow wronged her.

Everyday can be it’s own little adventure.

It was a fine weekend. Ali started working 4 days a week so she had Friday off. It works out well because it allows her to relax and do a few things around the house so we have less to do over the weekend.

On Saturday things started off real slow, I spent most of the morning playing WoW while Ali spent most of the morning in bed. It’s quite different from day’s past where I was ripping into chores at 7:30 in the morning. Eventually we got started on the chores. One of the things I wanted to get done was clean up the rat nest of hoses I had in the shed. It is the collection of hoses I used when I had the complex drip irrigation system set up. However I have had better results just going from plant to plant and soaking it real well with a hose once a week. So I had about 300 feet of tangled hose piled up in the back of the shed. So slowly I started to untangle and wrap up the hoses. As I was doing this, I managed to reaggravate the wrist that I had been resting for a week and a half. I hurt it doing nothing more than holding and wrapping hose. I was pissed. It is just ridiculous.

Later in the afternoon we had to run some errands. I stopped at Sports Authority to get new lifting gloves (with wrist wraps). As we went in, Ali pointed out that the Teddy Bear Museum was right next door and we could stop in. Ever since we moved to Naples, Ali has asked about going to this museum. She loves teddy bears. It is north mmerica’s only Teddy Bear Museum. Everytime she asked I would say something like “We can’t go today, they are closed right now”(they weren’t) “We can’t go, Nicki will miss you” or something silly like that. Obviously I don’t share her love of Teddy Bears. However this time I relented. I heard that the musuem was closing so if we didn’t do it now she would not get to see it ever. Plus, Ali certainly is accomodating of what I want normally so it was the least I could do. It was as you would think, a big area filled with teddy bears behind glass. No it was not exciting. The best part for me was seeing the collection of really old bears. They had some from the early 1900’s. I always find really old things interesting. I don’t know why. We found out the museum is closing the end of May so it was good that we saw it when we did.

During the weekend, Nicki did something she hadn’t done in over a year and a half, crapped in the house. The first time it happened on Saturday while we were out. Before we left I walked her for an extended period and she made no signs of having to do a number 2. However when we got home after being gone 3 hours or so, there was a big pile behind the bird cage. When we scolded her for it she ran off, embarrassed and sulked for awhile. The second time, it happened in the morning when I was up on my puter and Ali was in bed. Prior to this I had her out for an extended period and again she did no number 2. This time she crapped out on the lanai. She made no effort to come get me to let me know she had to go. I have no idea what the deal is. Hopefully it is a one weekend thing. Nothing will get me more riled up than the continued use of our living room as a bathroom by the mutt.

On Sunday we decided to take an extended walk down to the convenience store to pick up the paper and eat lunch. It was good exercise and nice change up in the routine. If I were to guess I would say the total distance was between 4 and 5 miles. Walking along side a busy road like ours gives you a first hand look at the laziness and ignorance of mankind as we stepped around countless beer bottles and other assorted trash.

For whatever reason on Sunday I also got inspired to get back up in the air. I haven’t touched my RC planes in well over 6 months. I decided I wanted to try to get my aerial photo rig up in the air and snap some pictures. So I charge up a few battery packs and the radio. I hook stuff up and have to try several configurations until I remember exactly how I had it all working together. I carefully carry everything out back, throw some grass into the air to test wind direction, snap a few photos on the ground to verify camera operation and then apply full throttle and TOSS. The plane gets maybe 20 feet out of my hand and the motor shuts off and the plane crashes lightly into the ground. Argh, dead battery pack. I charged 2 other packs. The best I got was maybe a 20 second flight. Evidently all my packs have taken a shit from being discharged for so long. Damn it. Time to buy new packs.

For those turned off by MMPORPG talk you can change the page now, this will be meaningless to you. On Sunday I was minding my own business, mining for minerals when I got attacked by a horde player. At first I just ran on my horse, figuring he would get the hint that I didn’t care to fight him. Well he continued and by the time I decided to return fire it was too late and he killed me. This set me off. So once I recovered my body I went on a rampage, killing any horde players that stood in my way, regardless of their level. The funniest episode went like this. A horde hunter decided to try to sic 2 computer controlled characters on me. As they attacked me, he stood not far away, evidently wanting to see me die from his prank. Well I killed the first one, and then when he saw I was going to kill the second one he turned and ran for his life up the hill. Once I dispatched the second bad guy, I hopped on my horse and chased the horde player all the way up the hill. I hopped off my horse, stunned the guy and killed him in a few hits, then spat on him. I really never partake in this sort of stuff because I hate when it is done to me, but for some reason the attack on me set off a feeling of revenge that had to be satisfied.

Anyone else think it is ridiculous and disgusting that the Terry Schiavo ordeal has gotten equal, if not more press than when the tsunami struck? People are more outraged about a woman that has been a vegetable for 15 years, being allowed to die than the daily casualties of our soldiers in Iraq? This is some f’d up world we live in.

I have done nothing but cardio at the gym for the last week and a half in an attempt to let some of my aches and pains in my joints heal up. It’s a bit of a bore and doesn’t feel as satisfying as lugging iron.

This weekend is pretty open. Next weekend my brother-in-law and his wife come down for a quick visit. I’ll take some pictures of the sodding I did last weekend. Everynight this week I’ve been running sprinklers in the areas to ensure all my hard work doesn’t wind up being dried up hay.