Archives October 2014

Last night the primary objective was to bake the famous chocolate cake for Cindy’s birthday.  I got a late start, not dumping my first ingredient until after 7PM.    Cake prep went pretty smoothly.  I poured a couple cupcakes that allowed us to preview what the cake will taste like when we cut into it tonight, Cindy and I both approved.

I had an odd message on my phone last night, it was from a Chinese sounding guy that said he was from UPS.  He told me that my package from China was being withheld until I provided a federal tax EIN for the running club.  I had ordered some race timing bibs from Ipico which are produced in China.  I have ordered them many times in the past and I never was told I needed to provide an EIN number in order to receive them.

I called back the number I was given and all I got was the Chinese guys voice mail whose greeting was simply his name with nothing else.  I then called the main UPS number and tried to unravel what was going on.  Unfortunately the woman on the other end, whom also had a strong accent that was tough to understand, could tell me nothing beyond what I could already see on the UPS web site.  The best she could do was promise a UPS person would contact me within 24 hours,   how efficient.

You may recall my week plus long bout with illness back in April.  During that time I suffered severe fatigue, a fever and some of the most debilitating diarrhea of my life.  During that illness I made several trips to the doctor where a lot of tests were done including relieving myself in a “hat”.  None of these tests ever revealed any sort of definitive answer to what was wrong with me.  I just slowly, very slowly got better. However I never have fully done so.

Ever since the illness things in my GI system have never returned to the way they were pre-illness.  Things look and feel different.  Now the absolutely the last thing I want to deal with is extensive testing on my digestive plumbing so I have just been biding my time, figuring sooner or later things will just work themselves out.  Well here I am, six months later, and things are still not worked out.

I am going to be trying some dietary changes to see if anything changes for the positive.  If not I won’t have much choice but to see a medical professional about it as clearly, something is not as it should be.

My dad, step mom and two of their dogs roll into Naples later today.  They will be here until early next week.  Unfortunately tonight and half of tomorrow will be tied up with race related work for the XC meet I am timing.  However after that I look forward to a few days of fun. My dad had last visited last year but Teresa has not been down at the house since I separated.  The weather is supposed to be great this weekend, I just wish the standing water would not be littering my property still.

Today is the birthday of two important people in my life.   Not only do they share the same spot on the calendar, they actually were born on the same day as well, binding them to travel through life at the exact same age.

Troy has been a friend of mine for approaching 25 years.  His mix of intelligence, humor and sarcasm has made him a natural fit for my personality.  Even though we don’t talk or get to see each other all that often, when we do, we make up for lost time.  We have been on some epic adventures together, the most memorable probably being our trips to Vegas and Green Bay.  Happy birthday buddy.

Cindy has been an injection of raw sunshine into my life since we started dating last year.  She is the most selfless person I have ever met and her appreciation for even the simplest and smallest things in life is admirable.  Her energy and work ethic seems inexhaustible at times, it’s amazing.

My relationship with her is 180 degrees different than any other I have had in my life, we just fit together well like Tetris pieces.  We both equally appreciate each other and it is a great feeling.  I’ll continue do my part to make sure she knows how much I appreciate and love her not only on her birthday but the other 364 days a year.  Happy birthday chica!

I had a very busy evening.  Even though it wasn’t raining there was still a lot of standing water in the yard.  Well I needed to mow anyway.  Mowing on  waterlogged, muddy grass requires a different mowing technique.  When entering an area that still was very wet I had to make sure I was hitting the spot in a straight line and with adequate momentum.  Failure to do either of these things could easily result in the tractor getting stuck in the bog.  You do more sliding  than turning in these sort of conditions.  By the time I was done I was able to knock down the majority of the grass but many spots in the yard looked like a 4 wheeler was let loose to wreak havoc.  Normally I would have just let the grass alone since it was still so wet but since my dad is visiting this weekend I wanted to get it done.

While I was mowing I had the chickens roaming around, they absolutely loved following behind me, harvesting the freshly mowed grass for bugs.  When we first got the chickens they were terrified of the mower and wanted nothing to do with it.  Now in the same manner they have warmed up to Cindy and I, the tractor is now not so scary.  Gaining their trust has been a fun experience.  Seeing how even chickens have personality, curiosity and playfulness makes me so happy that I no longer support the industry responsible for subjecting these animals to such cruelty.

While we were eating dinner we stumbled across the second Florida governor debate.  My dislike of the current Florida governor Rick Scott is well documented. His opponent, Charlie Crist, actually was the governor of Florida as a moderate republican from 2007-2011.  He has since changed his party affiliation to democrat, reenforcing my already favorable opinion of him.

Unfortunately I tuned in after #fangate, which was a great way to illustrate just how much of an a-hole Rick Scott is.  When Charlie Crist does public speaking he prefers to have a small portable fan with him to help keep cool.  In the debate guidelines Charlie even had use of the fan explicitly included.  Well shortly before the debate was about to begin Rick Scott had a shit fit, saying that use of the portable fan was in violation of the “no electronics” provision.  This provision is to prevent candidates from looking at notes/messages on a portable device during a debate as a crutch.  Anyone with half a brain would realize that a fan does not give a candidate an advantage with speaking points.

Well Rick proceeded to act like a child, threatening to not participate in the debate unless the fan was removed.  The debate was actually delayed for 7-8 minutes until someone thankfully talked sense into Scott, realizing that he was looking bad with his temper tantrum over something so insignificant.  The fan stayed despite Scott’s whining.

When the actual question and answers started flowing the difference between the two candidates was staggering.   Scott, in almost a Sarah Palin-like manner had a few go to zingers he relied heavily on, often inappropriately wedged in because he had nothing else to say. I was amazed just how awkward, nervous, and unpolished Scott was on stage.  He spoke too fast and often in broken/incomplete sentences.  His attacks on Crist were clumsy and delivered in such a way that carried no weight.  The biggest tool he had in the box was that Crist was governor when the entire country was in free fall.  Scott tried to make the point that somehow Crist was largely responsible for how the nationwide fiscal crisis affected Florida which is utterly ridiculous.

When Scott was asked questions that were intended to get him to clearly offer an opinion he more often than not talked awkward circles around it.  I found it especially entertaining when he was asked about his opinion on gay marriage and he gave a non-answer, refusing to endorse or condone it.  The debate panelist pressed him, pointing out he did not actually answer the question.  Scott spit out the same non-answer.  It was ridiculous.

In contrast Charlie handled the questions and barbs from Scott intelligently and with little difficulty.  He had no issues giving Scott some strong counter punches, including reaffirming the biggest and incredulous skeleton in Rick’s closet, his management of the company that was whacked with the biggest fine in US history for Medicare fraud and how Tricky Rick pleaded the 5th something like 75 times during the proceedings.  The fact that Scott was able to get elected the first time with this in his background is still astonishing to me but a testament to the ability of lots of money to sway the opinions of the lightly informed masses.

Pretty much ever single issue that was presented to the candidates I found myself aligned with Crist’s position and opposed to Scott.  Of course the appearance and likability between the two candidates is not even close.  Charlie carries himself so much better and is the more likeable candidate by a huge margin.

I was laughing out loud at Scott’s closing remarks which were delivered in the same clumsy manner as the rest of the debate.  He closed with saying something in haitian and spanish in a manner a 6 year old Russian kid would read the Gettysburg address.  It was simply awful and transparent.

Seeing the debate deepened my inner disgust that the governor race is supposedly neck and neck.  Contrasting the two candidates side by side makes it seem impossible to me that Scott is within 10 points of Charlie.  If Scott somehow manages to buy himself into a second term utilizing the financial juggernaut at his command to once again brainwash the sheep it will indeed be a very sad day in the Sunshine State.

After watching the debate I still had more to do.  I needed to get presents wrapped for Cindy’s birthday which is Friday.  After that Cindy and I worked on splitting up 800 race timing bibs into 32 envelopes for the cross country meet I am timing on Saturday.  Thank goodness Cindy helped me.

Last night we finished up season one of The Strain.  Although the show isn’t on the same level as Walking Dead or Breaking Bad I still enjoyed it and look forward to season two.

I talked to my dad and step mom last night.  They left yesterday from western PA on their trek down to Florida.  They are using a less aggressive driving plan, not arriving until Friday.  They made it into North Carolina on day one.  So far the trip seems to be going well.

Today is my sister Torrin’s birthday.  I know it’s a tough day for her since it will be her first one since my mom passed away.  Torrin spoke to mom more often than anyone else and I know her death has been very, very hard for her.  When she came down to Florida we leaned on each other to get through the emotional wringer.  It made me feel closer to Torrin. I hope I can continue to receive and offer her as much support as she needs from now on.

The drive home from work yesterday was not enjoyable.  There was an accident on one of the major arteries that snowballed as people trying to avoid it wound up rerouting, clogging those roads as well.  To get home I drove 5 miles north and then back south to get about a 1/2 mile further east, past the back up.  It was a lovely commute.

What also has been lovely is the continued onslaught of precipitation.  Yesterday we got dumped on again making any chance of the property drying out before my dads dogs arrive very, very remote.

For several years elections meant endless robo-calls from candidates.  I had expressed my hatred of them many times as well as questioning the logic behind pestering potential voters with them.   If anything, a robo-call made me less likely to vote for someone.  Well this year I have yet to receive one robocall however they have been replaced by an onslaught of emails, asking for campaign donations.  I bet in the past couple months I have literally received hundreds of requests to “chip in”.

Since I am still a registered republican but on the email list for organizations like moveon.org I get it from both sides of the political fence.  However I can tell you that the requests for money are heavily weighted on the democratic side.  I can only assume the republican party is less squeezed for dough thanks to their bread and butter constituents, corporate America who are now viewed as “people” thanks to the ridiculous Supreme Court ruling several years ago.

I have not donated a penny to either side.  I have pretty much given up any hope of our corporate controlled democracy righting itself during my lifetime.  The money in our country has their hands welded on the steering wheel that controls the direction our government goes. They just are not going to let go.

So this morning the headline was a second healthcare worker that was around patient zero (in the US) tested positive for Ebola.  There are all sorts of concerning and conflicting information being thrown out there, especially if ebola is not an “airborne” virus.  There are descriptions of how the infected man sat in the normal patient waiting room for hours exposed to who knows how many people during that time period.  There apparently was no special care given initially when handling the man’s fluid samples which could have given additional avenues for cross contamination.  The more you read the more obvious it becomes that the public is not being told the truth about the ease the virus can be spread, regardless of if it is technically not airborne by definition. Lying is a staple of the media after all.

Now of course inciting panic benefits noone, hell I already heard of some people calling for more or less of a culling in infected areas. However I think there is the potential for a major issue here.  After all we are entering cold/flu season  in the United States.  The initial ebola symptoms are flu or even cold-like so how do you discern between normal illness and a deadly virus?  By the time you realize it is something more serious you could have been actively spreading ebola unknowingly to countless people.

It doesn’t take a CDC expert to see how easily this could get out of control.   Something eventually is going to happen to perform a course correction on the exploding human population.  Most of us just hope it doesn’t occur in our lifetimes.

Cindy and I watched the season premiere of Walking Dead last night.  Wow, talk about starting the season with a bang.  There was enough action and chaos in it to make you think it was a series finale.  There was also boatloads of gore that was not the best compliment to the dinner Cindy and I were in the process of eating.  It was a great way to kick off the season and got me pumped to see what is next.

The onset of heavy rain again on Sunday night is putting a wrench in my plans to get the grass mowed this week before my dad and step mom arrive.  I can only hope massive evaporation occurs in the next day or so.  In addition to evening mowing I need to do more prep for the large cross country meet I am timing on Saturday.  I also need to make the famous chocolate birthday cake for Cindy’s birthday which is Friday.

Although I have other thoughts in my head, I have nothing else to share on this fine Tuesday.

This was the definition of a bust ass weekend.  It was one of those weekends where I am glad to get back to work to rest.  The majority of the labor came from the unplanned renovation of the garden.  Well it was planned, it just wasn’t planned to go down this weekend.

I wanted to make some changes to make the garden a little more user friendly.  When I laid out the raised beds originally my goal was to jam as many of them as possible into the fenced in space.  Unfortunately when I did so I gave little thought to accessibility.  I put the beds too close together.

Honestly I am amazed that I never broke an ankle with the old layout.  The space between beds was so tight that my foot would become wedged when stepping between them.  The tight quarters also made using my scuffle hoe between the beds to knock down weeds impossible at times.  I also had more beds in there than I really needed, most of the time I had beds either totally unused or only partially populated.

So my plan was to pull all of the old beds up and spread all the dirt that is in them around the garden evenly to raise the ground level up a few inches.  I then could lay out the beds in a different manner, sacrificing one or two of them in order to have more room to walk around in there.  I just hadn’t done it yet because of money (good garden soil costs $$), weather (hot and wet sucks), and finally effort (bust ass labor).

Well Cindy got the garden renovation schedule moved up because she was excited to do it.  She loves projects and a garden project she especially loved.  The temperatures were less than ideal, once again hitting 90 degrees although the humidity was not quite as oppressive as normal.  After we picked up the dogs to hang out at the house with us we got busy.

I helped Cindy with the initial part of the project, which was particularly gross, pulling out the two compost bins.  The bottom of the bins actually did have some legitimate looking compost but the upper half was a rat nest of dried up vegetation.  To make things more fun the bins were also home to a nest of cockroaches and fire ants.  I pulled the solid material out of the area and left the composted material in the garden to be mixed in.  Cindy then took over, her task being removal of the raised beds after digging up the dozens of sweet potatoes that were left in the garden while I hopped on the tractor.  Cindy looked at the task as a “workout” instead of a chore.

The good news was we had enough dry days that the back of the property was finally mowable.  The bad news was weeks and weeks of rain has turned the area into a jungle.  I first worked on the area on the outside of the fence, including some of the rear of the property that gets mowed once or twice a year.  Mowing these areas with a standard yard tractor requires patience.  Not only do you have to go very slow, you have to go over many areas more than once to knock down the highest and most dense grass/weeds.  Even with my tractor sunshade in place I was feeling the heat.  I could only imagine how hot Cindy must have felt ripping stuff out of the garden.

Cindy flagged me down after she got the old beds ripped out.  She asked if we could switch so she could take a break.  I said of course since the next stage of the project required using the tiller in the garden, something I would not task Cindy with.  I used the tiller to break up and mix the dirt.  After that it was manual labor time as I used a shovel and rake to smooth out the dirt at it’s new higher level which should make the garden more flood tolerant going forward.

The chickens loved this project.  They repeatedly were in the garden area digging around looking for nuggets.  With their affinity for dirt this was like one big sandbox of fun for them.

So once I had the area somewhat level I had Cindy help me with setting the raised beds back up.  This part of the project was tougher than I thought, not because of the labor but agreeing to a new layout.  Even though I had already agreed to have less beds in the space, when we laid out the beds in two long rows with ample walking lanes around them I felt like I was sacrificing too much raised bed real estate.  Even if I didn’t use all of the beds in the past, I guess I liked having more space available than I needed, just in case.

I stood there staring at the new lite layout for awhile trying to determine if I would be ok with it long term.  We did one little tweak that added one more half box to the garden and called it good enough.   I think it will be better in the long run.

During the afternoon Cindy called me over to the screen door.  About 5 feet away from the door was a coiled up pygmy rattlesnake.  I was surprised to see it, I haven’t seen one of them on my property for years.  The only snakes we typically see are harmless black racers.  I calmly told Cindy to go get me the pool skimmer, my snake removal tool of choice thanks to it’s long handle.

After some careful placement I got the snake to slither up onto the mesh portion of the skimmer however he didn’t want to stay put.  As I walked slowly towards the fence line the snake kept trying to slither off the skimmer.  For awhile I was able to keep him on it by rotating the skimmer in a fashion similar to wrapping spaghetti around a fork.  He eventually managed to fall off the skimmer.  Getting him back on a second time was a bit tougher as he struck at the skimmer a few times.  Finally I got him back on as I fast walked over to the fence.  Once I got there I launched him trebuchet style across the fence and drainage canal into the high brush where he would be free to continue doing rattlesnake things without endangering the dogs or chickens.

Saturday night Cindy and I were both beat, after we dropped the dogs back off we spent the evening at home.  We had Divergent sitting in a Netflix envelope at home to watch anyway.  This was a movie that we sort of considered seeing when it was in theaters but never got around to it.  I figured it would be a quality Netflix rental.

I found the movie to be just average.  I thought the story was overall weak and predictable.  I found myself doing a lot of not caring during the film.  I would only give the flick a B however Cindy thought it was significantly better than I did.  She said she would give it an A.  She thought the movie was similar to Hunger Games.  I did not other than the fact a young man and woman are involved in the story.

Sunday morning I was debating if I wanted to do the endurance training we had discussed the day before. Both Cindy and I were sore from the labor of Saturday and sleepy from staying up late Saturday watching The Strain episodes.  Originally I talked about biking to the track, running and then biking back.  We scaled it back to driving to the track, running and then going right to Lowes to buy garden soil.

I did less mileage than last week, I felt justified scaling it back based on what I did Saturday combined with the labor that was yet to come on Sunday.  I did however cover the 3.21 miles at the fastest overall pace I held all year outside of the New Years Day casual race I did.  Having 8:27 be my fastest 2014 running pace is part of my overall disappointing athletic accomplishments of 2014.  This is the first year in a long time where I have felt like overall my PTR’s have gone down instead of up.  The 8:27 pace was 15 seconds a mile faster than the week prior and 30 seconds a mile faster than two weeks ago so hopefully I can end the year on a high note. Cindy, despite it being only her second time running since her foot problems seems to be doing well.  She put in around 3 miles at a very solid 9:15ish pace.

We got the garden soil and vegetables for the refreshed garden at Lowes thanks to a 10% off your purchase coupon that Cindy wrangled for us.  The coupon wound up saving us nearly $25, I told you dirt was expensive.  The 25 bags of Miracle Gro were heavy, heavy enough to turn the normally high riding Tacoma into a low rider with the front end awkwardly pointing up in the air.  We got a variety of stuff for the garden including two types of lettuce, peppers, broccoli, stevia, eggplant, tomatoes and swiss chard.

Before lunch we got the new beds refilled with the fresh soil.  I handled the heavy lifting, lugging the bags into the garden and dumping them.  Cindy was on raking, spreading, tamping duty, making each bed suitable for planting.

We then both worked on getting the plants in the garden.  When we were done  I still had three totally empty raised beds that can be populated so it made me feel better about pulling out some of the beds in the renovation.  I discovered quickly that the chickens now need to be barred from the garden area until the young plants take hold and grow a bit.  In the span of two seconds one of them stripped all of the leaves off of one of the broccoli plants.  Cindy quickly herded them out before more damage could be done.

It was nice to get the garden project out of the way.  My next couple months will be busy enough as is, knocking this project off the list helps lessen the load.  As is often the case, Cindy’s seemingly endless supply of energy helped make it happen and it didn’t stop there.  As I was back outside finishing up the mowing I started Saturday she was busting ass inside, doing extensive cleaning in preparation of my dad and step mom’s arrival on Friday which included running the carpet cleaner.

I was quite glad to get all of the back yard mowing done and also happy that the months of standing water had come to an end.  Of course almost on cue, we had torrential rain last night that brought back the temporary lakes to the landscape.  I can only hope that we have a dry week that allows the water to seep back into the ground before Friday.  Having wet spots in the yard with dad’s dogs would be a recipe for a very dirty visit.

Over the weekend we added to the Halloween decorations at the house.  The inflatable black cat looks cool, at least from close up.  I was a bit disappointed that the LED lights inside of it are not bright enough to make the cats glowing eyes clearly visible from the road.  I threw my solar powered spot light in front of it to make it a little easier to be seen.

Wow that Eagles game was totally not what I expected it to be, and that is a good thing.  The Eagles nearly catastrophic collapse last week combined with the Giants coming in, who have been playing very well, looked like a recipe for a loss.  Instead the exact opposite happened.

The Eagles not only won, they smashed the Giants, pitching an incredibly rare shutout, 27-0.  There were so many things that happened that were a turn around from the first 5 games this season.  LeSean McCoy actually was effective, gaining more yards than the last 3-4 games combined.  The defense looked ferocious.  Not only did they constantly pressure Eli Manning, they actually stuffed the run as well, something they just don’t ever do.

Even more amazing was the team actually played all 60 minutes, not falling into that all too familiar trap of giving up lots of points in a short time period when holding a big lead.  The defense clamped down and made the Giants look like shit.  It was really an amazing defensive performance and made me remember the days when the Eagles were known more for their defense than their offense.

The only reversal that was not there was Nick Foles.  He continues to make some really poor throws at times that are flamed by throwing off balance.  Both of the interceptions he threw were 100% his fault.  I’m hoping this is just a small bump in his road to improvement.

This week is going to be very busy.  Pretty much every evening has some sort of to do on the docket.

Last night Cindy and I were working on our normal evening chicken duties.  I normally will let them out as soon as I get home so they get some free ranging time each day.  After I change I come back out and start with the stuff like moving the coop, and dumping/cleaning the water and food.  Typically as I do this the chickens will be milling around me.  Even though I am sure the primary reason they stay so close is they associate me with food, I imagine they actually do like us a little bit.  No matter how shitty your day was a few minutes hanging out with the chickens will brighten your mood.

Yesterday I at least got something related to my mom’s estate taken care of, her vehicle.  I successfully got the title transferred from her name into my, Todd & Torrin’s name.  There is an OR between each of our names on the title meaning I will be able to sell it myself.  In order to do this I had to get Torrin and Todd to sign and mail automobile power of attorney forms to me.  I am hoping the sale of the Rav 4 will at least let me replenish the money I have fronted so far.  Once the bank accounts are split I can handle paying off the remaining debt that is out there in mom’s name.

All of the stuff I have been dealing with this week with mom’s estate has shuffled the emotional embers related to her passing.  We are almost two months past her death and I still feel like it hasn’t really hit me.  Sure I have had many times over the past couple months where I had quick hitting rushes of emotion and/or tears but I never had anything close to a full fledged breakdown.  At this point I am not sure that I ever will.

My entire life I have had such hang ups about growing old and death that I think my internal circuitry will not allow me to dwell on the feelings, regrets, and finality of mom passing for more than a few moments at a time.  It’s almost like an automatic emotion suppression system kicks in, perhaps as unconscious self defense.   Whatever the proper psychological diagnosis is of my reaction to all of this, it feels like the only way I can deal with it.

This weekend will be my last before my dad, step mom and their two dogs arrive next Friday.  There will probably be another list created to make sure what needs to get done gets done.

Last night after work I headed outside to add some pull ups to my 1000 pull up challenge series.  I mixed them in with chicken care. We had the chickens out while we did the daily maintenance and relocation of their mobile home.  The chickens find me doing pull ups to be interesting, they are fond of milling about my feet as I do them as you can see here.

I did a total of 100 reps, the first time I packed 100 pull ups into a workout in quite awhile.  Today I have a sore back and a blistered thumb to show for it.  The pain is worth the price, it felt good to feel stronger on the bar than I have for awhile.

On my way home last night I had a Chevy Avalanche come whipping up behind me followed by it darting around me.  I was already going nearly 10mph over the speed limit.  The truck continued weaving back and forth between cars as it pulled away.  I immediately noticed the large confederate flag that was secured over the tailgate as well as a large REDNECK sticker on the rear window.  I was not surprised that someone that drove in this manner also was a strong supporter of the confederacy.

So when I caught up to this vehicle at the next stop light I snapped a picture and later posted it to FB with the following caption “More than likely not a real deep thinker.” Although there were several layers to the North-South conflict in the Civil War, the one aspect of it that makes it truly disgusting is slavery.  Openly flaunting your support of a time and place that embraced treating human beings as material items that are acquired, consumed and then tossed away just does not make sense to me in any context.

Well my post to FB annoyed some and brought agreement from others.  In retrospect I would have been better served to just bottle up my aggravation and not post the picture.

So yesterday I checked the mailbox after work as I normally do.  Mixed in with the letters was a small box with THE COLLECTION on the outside of it.  It was addressed to me or current resident.  Weird.  I had no idea what it was.

When I opened the thing up I was even more confused, it was underwear.  This wasn’t just any underwear, it was Depends underwear, yes the adult diaper people.  Reading the literature in the box told me I was the lucky recipient of two pair of “Real Fit” Depend undergarments.  There was a picture of a hip looking dude in his diaper on the inside as well.  I thought I was being punked.

I pulled out the underwear, I was given one pair of L/XL and one pair of S/M adult diapers.  Apparently these are not designed for grandpa who might be using diapers to catch everything that exits his body.  These metrosexual Depends appear to be targeted at middle aged men that might have a problem with urine leakage.

I was still amazed these were sent to me.  I can only assume it was solely based on my age since I am much closer to 50 than 40.  Of course I took a picture and posted it to FB.  There were some good suggestions coming in for their use, including some that could translate well to YouTube.  I boxed my diapers back up and put them in a safe place for future use.

I heard guys on the Stern Show talking about a show they are watching called The Strain, which I never heard of.  Evidently the season finale just aired and they were commenting how awesome the show was.  I looked into the premise of the show, plague and vampires and found it intriguing.  Cindy and I watched the first two episodes last night on demand and are hooked, well I am.  There are some very scary, disturbing elements in the show that made Cindy cringe, but even if she taps out, I’ll definitely be watching the season myself if need be.  It’s great, in an apocalyptic sort of way.

Todd went to a local Wells Fargo in PA to see if he had any better luck getting the magical Medallion Guardian Signature stamp that we need to get the stock certificates my mom owned transferred and sold.  The hope is since he has a relationship with his local branch and that he is friends with a WF employee that somebody will do us favor and stamp the damn form for us.  Todd’s initial attempt was unsuccessful  but he wasn’t dealing with the people that he knows.  He is going to give it another shot later in the week.  If he strikes out as well I am running out of options short of the three of us being forced to meet up to jump through a hoop that should not be there if somebody would possess any degree of compassion or common sense.

I have had a lot of hurdles to cross since my mom passed away when it comes to the many, many items that have needed to be addressed, not to mention the emotional aspects of it.  Well yesterday was the most frustrating day thus far when it comes to the task of handling my moms estate.

Years ago mom said how she wanted to get my name on her bank accounts as well as give me power of attorney.  Somehow that time never came.  I feel partially responsible for the headaches I now have as a result of this not happening.  I could have pushed mom harder to get it done.

So anyway, yesterday I headed to the same Wells Fargo branch that I have been dealing with trying to get her bank account and IRA liquidated.  It was determined that we could not use an estate account because of the way Summary Administration probate works where there is no executor or personal representative.  Instead there needs to be three checks cut for each account my mom had, splitting each one in a third.  With her bank accounts that adds up to a total of nine checks.  Her IRA, which for some reason can not be handled at the same time, will go through a similar process so in total there will be four checks going to myself and my siblings.  This is a pain in the ass from my perspective since I have been managing things from the start with the assumption that we would be able to split the funds after expenses and costs were taken out.  Now that stuff has to be taken out after the split and returned to me via Todd and Torrin writing a check back to me.

I still do not feel assured that those accounts will be liquidated and split as I was told they would be just based on the way things have gone.  The branch manager was totally clueless on this process and he has gotten some conflicting information from the people he has had on the phone.  I can only hope it is handled quickly and properly.

So while I was dropping off the paperwork to get the bank accounts handled I brought up to the branch manager my mom’s stock assets.  Mom had Sherwin Williams stock that she got as an employee back in the 80’s.  It was a reinvestment account so over the last 30 years what was originally 2 shares had grown into around 60 shares.

I thought I had a simple plan to handle these assets.  I obtained online account access to the stock which just happened to be another Wells Fargo account.  Once the court order was signed I went in and executed a sell order on all of the stock, or so I thought.  When the check showed up the other day it was a little more than a third of the total value of the account, wtf??

I went back online and looked.  There were 32 shares still sitting in there and I was unable to do anything with them.  I later discovered that the reason was those 32 shares were stock certificates, something different than electronic shares.  Well I now I had a whole new set of problems to deal with.  I called up the support number for the account and explained my situation.  Well as soon as I told the rep that I was accessing my deceased mother’s account she immediately told me that she had to disable online access to the account.  I wasn’t pleased but couldn’t really argue otherwise as from a security perspective that would be a red flag.  Luckily I had taken a screen shot of the current account status before my access was revoked.

I continued to outline my dilemma and asked how I would handle it.  She said that the ownership of the stock needs to be transferred via something called a Stock Power Form which she emailed to me.  I had this form with me and presented it to the branch manager for guidance on how to fill it out.  I pointed out a particular section of the form that required a “Medallion Signature Guarantee”, something I never heard of but sounded ominous.  The branch manager again did not know much, but he did know that his branch did not have anyone that possessed this stamp, evidently it is something you have to be qualified for, almost like being a notary.  He did know enough to tell me that a branch about 5 miles away did have staff with this title and that I could go there.  So that’s what I did.

I drove to the next branch and while I was waiting filled out the sections of the form that were straight forward.  After about 15 minutes I was told they could see me.  I presented my form to the bank guy.  He looked it over and said all he would need is my Wells Fargo debit card.  Huh?  I told him I don’t have a Wells Fargo account.  He said that they couldn’t help me, the only way they can do the signature is with a current Wells Fargo account holder.  They said I could open an account but even if I did, I would have to wait TWO MONTHS until they would be allowed to do it.  WTF!!  I told them the branch manager I just talked to did not mention anything about this restriction, he definitely knew I did not already have a WF account.  They shrugged their shoulders and apologized.

They said that I should be able to get the signature at the credit union that I belong to.  This did not compute to me, why would I go to my credit union to get authorization to transfer stock managed by Wells Fargo.  The WF guy assured me that they could do it as this Medallion Signature is more or less a higher level notarization that is required for stock transactions.  Ok fine, I headed to my third financial institution of the day, thank goodness I have an understanding boss.

So I get to the CU and wait for another 20-25 minutes to see someone.  I get waited on by a woman that I have dealt with before on other loan paperwork.  She said she sort of recognizes me.  I explain to her what I needed and why I needed it.  Her initial reaction was tentative, I could tell she didn’t really feel like dealing with it.  She told me she needed certain documentation to consider doing it.  She said it in a way that made me think she thought I didn’t have it with me so she could dismiss my request and move on.  Unfortunately for her I had the death certificate, court order and stock statement, sort of.

She said that the value of the stock needs to be verified and required a current statement.  I told her I had older paper statements with me but not the very latest.  I did have the screen shot of the account status prior to my access being revoked that morning sitting in my Dropbox.  She said I could email it to her bank email address.  My first email to her arrived with a Dropbox link in it.  The CU firewall evidently forbids access to Dropbox so she could not get the file.  Ok, I am resourceful so I instead saved a copy of the screenshot to my phone and emailed it to her as an attachment, twice.  Evidently the CU email system shit cans emails with .jpg attachments.  WTF.

I was getting very aggravated.  The amount of stock in the big picture was very small and the woman could just look at the image on my phone to verify it, but no, she needed a print out.  With my developing understanding that a Medallion Signature is really just another way to confirm the identity of someone I did not understand why this song and dance was being asked of me.  I have been a customer of the CU for going on 15 years, I have all the paperwork that confirms my mom’s death, and the stock transaction I am trying to get done has absolutely nothing to do with the credit union and everything to do with Wells Fargo.  The woman said she could not proceed until she had the stock account print out.

Well my internal gears were still spinning.  I suggested to the woman that if she could give me a personal email address that does not have such restrictive filter.  She was not interested in that option.  I still was not going to give up.  The credit union office is literally next door to one of our branch offices.  I told her I would be back in 10 minutes.  I walked out the door and down to our building.  I hopped on one of the girls computers, accessed my email and printed the fcking stock statement and marched right back into the CU.

I came back into the woman’s office with the stock statement triumphantly in my hand.  She greeted my accomplishment with a “too bad, so sad” tone as she told me that while I was gone she called a “supervisor” and explained the situation.  She said she was told that because the court order has all three of our names on it that they can’t do the stamp.  As you can imagine, I was not pleased.

As I was entering my 3rd hour of fcking around with banks my patience had eroded.  I went on probably a 5 minute rant where I expressed my discontent that the credit union was being so uncooperative in this process.  The woman said that beyond having the three of us present at one time she did not have any advice for me.  I told her that it was ridiculous to offer that as the only viable answer considering the geography of the three parties involved.  As I ranted and ranted she had this look on her face that annoyed me further.  I could tell she was just waiting for me to finish and she wasn’t really listening to my logic.  She didn’t give a fck.

The bottom line was if this woman looked at the situation realistically she could have just stamped my form and sent me on my way, with no issues.  However, in this cover your ass, make decisions based on policies written without allowing for consideration for personal judgement world, she took the easy way out.  It’s always easier to say no.

I left the credit union office fed up to the utmost level.  I called my lawyer that handled the probate.  He said the signature medallion stamp was stupid and shouldn’t even be used anymore.  He also said that the CU rep was out of line denying it but he had no alternative action for me, he can’t force them to stamp it.

I arrived back at the office fuming, hungry and annoyed I had to skip my lunchtime gym session.  I called up the main credit union office to again pitch my case.  I call and explain my situation briefly which got me transferred to a bitchy sounding woman.  I explained my situation a second time.  She offered up a simpleton response saying “I guess she cant do it because of multiple people involved”  When I tried to explain the details of why that answer was not good enough I got a “Please hold” followed by music.  The bitch threw me on hold for close to 5 minutes until a man picked up.

I told him that whomever I just talked to threw me on hold with no explanation and that I thought that was rude and unprofessional.  I asked that if he knew who took the call last that he informs the woman or her supervisor that I did not appreciate it.  I then began my explanation a third time.  Unlike the first two people I spoke to, this guy actually listened to me and understood my frustration that nobody is considering that my brother and sister are out of state and that saying they need to be present was ridiculous.

He put me on hold multiple times while he sent internal communications to a number of people trying to get some traction that we could use to call back the branch I was at and instruct them to provide the stamp on the document.  He really tried hard but ran into the same magical “supervisor” that is more interested in procedures than customer service.  He said officially the answer is still the same but he actually advised me to go to one of the other local credit union branches to see if I deal with a rep that realizes the situation and acts appropriately based on it instead of hiding behind a supervisor on the phone.  It seemed bizarre that this was the official recommendation.

Since then I sent out an email to my brother and sister expressing my frustration and asking if either of them had Wells Fargo bank accounts which MAY make the process more doable.  Todd called me last night and said he did so I am calling back Wells Fargo today to see if we can get away with just him being present to sign the form to transfer the stock ownership.  I am crossing my fingers it is.  I could use some good news.

Thankfully after three relatively dry days Cindy and I were able to get the grass mowed and trimmed around the house on Saturday.  That was only a couple items on the long to do list that I wrote out for the weekend.  Cindy actually likes when I make lists like this as it helps keep her on point.  The yard looked so much better by the time we were done.

I took the dogs back to Ali whom got back from France in the wee hours of Saturday morning.  Of course the girls were thrilled that Ali was back.  I spent a few minutes hearing about the trip.  It sounded like Ali had an awesome time which I was happy to hear.

One of the other tasks we took on was some organization of different areas of the house.  Cindy did most of that, my main contribution came in the hobby room where I got rid of a bunch of boxes that were wasting a shelf and I mounted a hook on the wall where my various door mounted pull up equipment now hangs.

On Saturday night we made our return to the movie theater, something we hadn’t done in well over a month.  We went to see The Equalizer with Denzel Washington.  Denzel has done a number of movies where he comes off as a BAMF and it’s a role he is good at.  The movie could have also been called 50 ways to Die as it seemed like every scum that Denzel wiped clean was offed in a unique manner, some of them were quite disturbing for sure.  The film totally scratched my revenge plot itch.  I enjoyed it enough to just squeeze into an A- rating.

Cindy and I woke up Sunday morning after a very rare session of sleeping in until almost 8AM to absolutely beautiful weather.  The temps were in the mid-60’s and the air was missing the oppressive humidity that has been present for most of the last 6 months.  Cindy immediately started circling the house, opening every window she could to let the fresh air circulate.  It was awesome.

Since we planned to do a run that morning it worked out even better as I always greatly prefer running in cooler temps.  We headed to the track where I put in 4 miles at around an 8:45 pace, the farthest run I have done in a long time.  This was the first time Cindy has run since her foot injury 3 months ago.  She probably did more than she should have but reported she felt fine after logging 3.25 miles of her own.

We went right from running to a number of errands.  One of those errands  included refilling the gas cans that I use for the lawn equipment.  I went an extra 10 miles round trip out of my way to the gas station with the ethanol free blend.  To me, it’s just worth it.  By the time we got home it was almost noon, meaning the Eagles game was coming up.

Wow that game was such an emotional roller coaster that despite being a win almost felt like a loss.  Once again the special teams and defense came up big, scoring touchdowns, without those scores the Birds would have been screwed.  Despite the offense not playing all that well, the Eagles had what you would think was an insurmountable lead of 34-7 in the 3rd quarter.  Well obviously if you saw the final score, that was not the case.

The failure to hold the lead was a total team effort.  Of course the defense was the most visible failure, letting the Ram’s march down the field matador style time and time again, allowing them to easily score three touchdowns in rapid fire succession.   Sure I expect some degree of prevent when up by that much but this defense was softer than a 300 pound woman’s rear end.

The offense was equally inept when it came to playing with a lead.  I understand that Chip Kelly’s offensive scheme is all about speed, running plays in less than half of the allotted time on the play clock all game long. However when you have a large lead, this play style no longer is benefiting you.  The team needs prolonged, ball control drives to consume clock and grind the other team into the dirt.  The Eagles are noticeably uncomfortable running the offense at a conventional pace and there is absolutely no reason for this.  They can run the exact same plays the always do, just huddle up and snap the ball with 5 or less seconds on the play clock.  It’s stupidly simple yet Kelly does not have the team do it.

The problem is compounded by the Eagles running game vanishing over the last 3 weeks.  McCoy did slightly better this week but overall was ineffective.  I was so tired of seeing him take the hand off and his first step is not forward, it’s a tap dance side to side which more often than not results in him being tackled for no gain or a loss.  Yes I realize there is something going on with the O-line that isn’t making holes that McCoy feels comfortable with but the guy has to stop losing yardage.  A small hole is better than a 2 second stutter step and being tackled, get your ass moving up field.

After I have proclaimed Nick Foles the QB I have been waiting for after the Redskins game he has really been underperforming and more troubling, just making bad decisions.   To fumble the ball because you fall head first to the ground instead of safely sliding in inexcusable.  I also could not believe how many times he was throwing while falling backwards or off balance.  The team was very lucky Foles didn’t get picked off more yesterday.  In addition to these mental blunders Foles has not been very accurate with his passing recently, missing open receivers down the field in almost a McNabb like manner.  He obviously needs to play better.

So anyway, as good as I felt about the team after starting 3-0 is how unsure I am with the team at 4-1.  If they don’t start doing the basics better we may have had the highlights of the year already transpire.

Over the weekend I also finished off the end raid boss in the latest WoW expansion.  It took 3 deaths to get through it but that made the end result more satisfying.  Virtual victory is still a victory.

After the game I worked on the potential award podiums that I bought for the club.  I drilled four holes into the frame of each stand, breaking two drill bits in the process.  After creating the holes I cut four pieces of poster board to size and attached them.  My initial thought was I could print out the graphics for each podium, cut them out and use packing tape to attach them to the poster board.  After testing that strategy out it looked too cheap to me.  I think we will have our graphic design person have something professional crafted for them instead.

Last night Cindy and I watched Despicable Me 2.  I never saw the original.  It was silly and cute as most animated films these days are.  It easily is worth a B+ rating.