"UMMMM I'm Thirsty"

Okay -- before I get to my most curious title I must first ask if anyone besides me has noticed that the Kleenex Tissue in some hotels changes colors? -- I've noticed this once before, and today I noticed it again, its true. Every three or four tissues the color of the the dispensed tissue changes from white to off white. Just a curious observation, but really why? No doubt (much like flavored dentists gloves) its more expensive, and certainly a more complicated manufacturing process. Who knows?

A long time ago I found myself literally thrust into the vending business. When Amy and I moved to Houston we decided that those days were behind us, but after just ten short months I found myself once again negotiating vending contracts. This time however I focused only on Fitness Centers where the discretionary income is higher, and things like Myoplex, and Monster energy drinks can sell for 3-5 dollars. So there is the quick background, because of our small size I pay a company to receive my beverage orders, but I store them in my garage (which was built too short to hold my exceptionally long truck) -- note to self, for next house measure truck before commencing a build.

Over the years (two and a half) that we have lived in our neighborhood I have OCCASIONALLY, been known to take a couple of Powerades over to the boys next door playing basketball, or offered a drink to the odd neighbor. I don't really make a habit of it, but if I have extra drinks, am working outside, and happen to see a couple of kids, I'll offer them a drink.

Amy had mentioned to me some time ago that the doorbell rings a couple of evenings a week, and that she would ignore it -- as she was never expecting anyone, and didn't want to deal with a potential sales person. I never really thought anything of it, then on Sunday this week I was draining the water heater for its annual preventative maintenance (can you tell I use to be a maintenance guy). Anyway, this required the garage to be open and me watching the water drain out of a hose (by the way only in Texas have I seen a water heater in the attic.) After some time three boys came up and gave me the look. After a few awkward moments they asked if they could have a drink. I probably had 30 cases in the garage, and decided I could give each of them a Powerade. After thanking me they gleefully ran off and disappeared. Five minutes later three girls show up, they too would like a drink. I oblige -- and really don't think anything of it. I do make mental note at this time that kids are getting more brazen, and I should probably not make this too much of a habit.

A couple of hours later Amy and I are watching a movie - and the volume is up pretty loud and at some point I think I hear something unusual, but dismiss it. A couple of minutes later I clearly hear the doorbell. I go to the door and answer it -- there are three of the six kids I gave drinks to earlier standing at my doorstep -- suddenly one remarks "Ummmm, I'm thirsty." While I felt like telling them to go home and get a drink, I was much nicer than that, and simply explained that I'd given away all I could for the day.

It turns out I should have omitted the 'day' part of my answer. The very next evening as Amy and I were watching something on the TV (I'm sure it was the 700 Club, or some TBN special, or maybe it was Paris Hilton's My New BFF, I can't remember). Anyway I suspect it could again be these kids, much to my surprise I open the door to see seven children at my doorstep and overflowing into the lawn. "Do you have any drinks today?" they ask. I suddenly realize that these kids must do this all of the time, and Amy just ignores them. I firmly advise all of the beggars that I can't give out drinks all the time, and that while once in a while I can give some out, they mustn't knock and the door to ask for drinks. They all agree and go away.

I want to be a nice guy, but seriously -- there are A LOT of kids in our hood. I don't want to become the local watering hole for the underage children in our neighborhood. Especially since Amy and I don't have any kids of our own. What will people think?

Have a great day!

Bathroom Noises

My husband loves the stories I tell when I emerge from the ladies' room. Women are, by nature, very social creatures. We do everything in groups, including visits to the loo. As a result, there is always a lot of chatter. As requested by my husband, I will share a couple of the recent stories with you.

The first took place at church. Our church is very large, and so are the restrooms. They can accommodate at least 40 women at a time. I was in the upstairs ladies room - on the third floor - the Sunday School floor. It's important to note that not everyone at our church attends Sunday School - only those who are serious church goers - those who desire to learn more about God - who really want to live a Godly life. Those who are just Sunday-morning Christians stay on the first or second floors and do not venture up to the third and fourth floors. So here I was, on a Sunday morning, just before class began, in a crowded third-floor ladies' room which was buzzing with giggles and chatter, when above all of the noise, we heard an exclamation of "OH S#^!" The entire room became silent. No one even dared to breathe loudly enough to be heard. It's church after all, and someone just uttered a completely unladylike expression in the House of God. After a few long moments of uncomfortable silence, a small voice said, "I'm so sorry, ladies. I just dropped my Bible in the toilet." After a few of the giggles and chuckles settled down, a more mature-sounding voice calmly and kindly inquired, "Is it the Bible you write in?" The reply came softly, "No, I dropped it in a puddle outside last week, and this was my replacement Bible." After a short pause, the mature voice replied with, "Well, honey, fish it out a' there. Throw it away. Buy you a new Bible, and this time get you a Bible cover with some handles so that you can hold onto it. You'll be alright." Seconds later we heard some splashing around, which I can only guess were the sounds of the poor dear fishing her new Bible out of the toilet. When I emerged and told my husband the story, I thought he was going to bust a gut. I almost had to pick him up off of the floor in the hallway. Every week since, he has asked me for the most recent story. There is always a story, but this one has topped them all for several weeks now.

My soapbox interlude: One of my pet peeves is when mothers think it's OK to bring their older boys into the ladies' room, especially considering that so many places now have family rooms and most especially when the dads are there and just refuse to take any responsibility for the kids. As I am not a mother, I am not exactly sure what the cut-off age should be, but I have been in the ladies' room and had women walk in with their sons who are as tall as I am. Seriously, if he's as big as I am, shouldn't he be able to wipe his own hiney? And if you're worried about a predator, if he's that big and doesn't know how to fight, enroll him in karate or something. STOP bringing him into the ladies' room. That just makes him a pervert and grosses the rest of us out.

That said, my next story is about a little boy in the ladies' room - a little boy who could not have been older than three. When we were at Ben & Jerry's in Vermont, I entered the ladies' room. There was a lady standing by the sinks who asked, "Is everything OK, Jared?" Suddenly one of the stall doors opened and out came the cutest little blond-haired boy who, while displaying jazz hands and a giant smile, loudly exclaimed, "Ta Da!" as he exited the stall. How cute is that?! Don't be surprised if you ever see Steve or I exciting a loo with jazz hands and a smile while exlaiming, "Ta Da!" We find this hilariously funny and now do it all of the time. Feel free to join us in our silliness, if you would like.

It is also important to note that womens' fitting rooms in department stores are also places that women gather and feel free to say anything. Tales from the fitting rooms to follow at a later date. (Although truth be told, my mom and I probably have caused more people to chuckle than anyone else. We act so silly when we're together. I may even divulge some of our tales.)

The Dreaded Allergies

I don't claim them -- I don't say 'My allergies are bothering me' -- but some stray allergens have found their way to my body and are giving me a really hard time. I was never bothered by allergies until I moved to this part of the country (meaning OK and TX) -- but since I have discovered this new challenge in my life I have worked very hard to find a solution to make the symptoms less intrusive.

Any ideas??

I've tried all the big names, and ultimately have found that treating the symptoms with regular cough syrups is the best solution. The problem is most of those things are off limits when operating heavy equipment like say -- an airplane. Yesterday at the store I found Zicam Allergy Formula -- I tried it and it seems to have worked a miracle. I'll keep you posted.

In the past the most effective treatment has been some advice offered by an old guy named Larry Miller (Miller Swim School for you Tulsans) -- he said to open my eyes under running water every day and wash out my nose in the shower. Doing that at least once a day does help some. Larry swore that he does it every day of his life and has never had any allergy symptoms since.

Amy has even had a little bit of allergy symptoms -- it must be Houston, maybe we should hit the road again -- more to come

Steve

Fall Tour of New England - Week Two

We just wrapped up our second week of our Fall Tour of New England. WOW! I don't think my pictures do it justice, but at least you can have an idea of what we saw.

We started with a full day in NYC - our favorite city to visit. We spent time shopping - Bloomingdale's, Tiffany's, FAO Schwartz, to name some of our favorite spots. And yes, we started our Christmas shopping!!!

Then we went down to the financial district. Steve had never been in that part of Manhattan before, and neither of us had been since 9/11. Here are a few pics:

Steve in front of the New York Stock Exchange:

The famous bull - notice all of the Chinese people who were taking their own photos with the bull. Seriously, just how much of that bull is going to show up in your picture when you're taking a self-portrait that close? There were so many Chinese people surrounding it, that we couldn't get any closer to take a better picture.
Then we headed over to Ground Zero, if you can still call it that. It is no longer just a giant whole in the ground. It is full of construction, and it's difficult to get close enough to take a picture. The city is definitely rebuilding.

These pictures were taken through a small whole in the fence.

The construction dumpsters are all painted with a reminder of why they are there.
Yes, I know, I took a picture of a garbage dumpster; but in this case, I truly believe it's art.

And there are still crosses and other monuments made from the remnants of the WTC that line the streets near the construction site.Steve's First Officer for the week experienced and survived 9/11. He told Steve all about it. Hopefully Steve will be able to share that with you within the next week or two. Even though it seems at times like it happened so long ago - it seems like it could never happen again - it happened. It happened here. And we must never forget!

Our day in NYC included lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe in Times Square. (And for those interested in pop culture, yes, we saw the Naked Cowboy. He's not all that impressive.) We had dinner at our favorite pizza place in Little Italy - Rudy's. We sat on the sidewalk patio and enjoyed a perfectly beautiful evening while we ate our pizza. We had a fabulous time!

Then we were off to New Hampshire. We stayed at a beautiful inn. They have a really nice courtyard with trees and a pond filled with koi. Steve just had to take this picture of the sign posted above the pond.

Our favorite part of this sign is "if you must make a wish". Seriously, are there people out there who MUST make a wish?! (Those of our readers with three-year-old boys may indeed know of someone who MUST make a wish! lol)

Once again, we took a road trip. We went from New Hampshire to Vermont. It was raining, and most of the pictures were taken from the car; but here are some New Hampshire pics:

Then we crossed over into Vermont - which I must say is the most gorgeous place we visited this year. We even had to pull over a few times to take some pictures.

While in Vermont, we visited the Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Factory - complete with free samples of their new flavor - Half Baked. It is DE-LISH!

It's official - we love New England in the Fall.

Oh Happy Day!!

We promise there will be pictures from our recent travels, but for now you are just going to have to wait!


The never ending battle that I have with Comcast seems to have been momentarily settled -- since we switched to HD we have gone through six converter boxes as it never seems to work right. The shows we are watching skip a lot, and the sound will mute frequently for no reason. Yesterday I once again make the journey to the Comcast store, waited in the un-necessarily long line, watched children that were lacking guidance and discipline run around the place like lunatics. Seriously, when you tell a child no, and he throws a fit, and you ultimately give in and allow the previously forbidden behavior, they learn -- throw fit = get what I want. I learned that on Supernanny, I can't take all the credit.


Anyway after I reached the counter I was as pathetic as possible, tried my hardest to appeal to the nice agents emotions, and it worked -- she gave me a different model that (gasp) had never been used before, lets keep our fingers crossed that it will continue to function as designed.

As I was re-reading my post about fun times in Utah I was reminded of another really humorous story that I thought I would share. One morning while watching the news I saw an interview with a guy that owned a business installing Christmas lights. Being the go-getter that I am -- I too formed a Christmas light installation business by noon that very day with a friend of mine. It was a crazy idea, but resulted in ridiculous success. Early on in our venture we would accept any client (later we limited it to those who lived in gated neighborhoods, and had at least one 60K + car in the garage).


One of our first customers was this really old couple, once we arrived my buddy told me to drive on, and not even stop. I was tempted but wanted to follow through with the appointment I had set. There was a string of mini-lights on their front walkway that appeared to have been there since 1960. The woman who lived there told me she called to have them replaced because they no longer worked. These lights actually disintegrated in our hands as we removed them. Mind you we didn't need a ladder, the roof line was so low that we could reach them from standing in the front yard. Once we got it all done the nice lady had an extra string left over.


I asked her where she wanted them, she told me that she wanted them put on her bush. Now I've scoured the Internet looking for a picture that somewhat resembles what this bush looked like, and here is the result.



Picture this bush in the middle of a front yard -- the pinnacle of the landscape if you will. She seemed very proud of her bush. Anyway I confirm with her a couple of times that she actually wants this thing illuminated. She confirms my suspicions, and I begin wrapping, or really draping the bush in mini-lights. Now as you can see this bush is very brittle, and highly entangled. As I pushed the lights in between the branches the entangled mess was getting worse.

As I was nearly done the nice woman came out and declared "I've decided I don't like how that looks, lets just take those off." This was going to be a delicate operation, every time I removed part of the string, hunks of branch would break off in my hand. At some point the lady comes out on her porch to preview my progress, at the same time I am getting a little more aggressive, I pull the lights just a little, and suddenly the entire bush breaks off at the ground and is in my hand. I am instantly horrified, but to my relief the homeowner doesn't seem to notice. I start laughing pretty hard while quickly ripping off the rest of the lights. Once I get them all off I shove the stump end of what is now a twig into the ground and continue laughing almost uncontrollably. The nice lady notices, and wonders about what I am laughing -- I play it off and quickly wrap things up -- and away we go.

Every time I see a bush like this I think of this story, and oh how funny it was to be there -- the horror that I felt when her prized bush was literally destroyed at my hand. I remember thinking that whomever mows the lawn next will hit it, it will fall over and they will think that they destroyed the bush.

Oh fun times -- please have a great day -- and BELIEVE that there will soon be a post with pictures.

Why Does the Bird Hate Me?

I spoke on the phone the other day to a woman from Utah who I used to work with. I was asking some questions about when Amy and I should travel to Utah for a scenic drive. After I hung up I was thinking about the fun I used to have when working for this company called Outdoor Recreation (need I remind everyone of being a snow-mobile guide without ever having actually been on a snow-mobile myself).

There are many, many funny stories from my time at Outdoor Recreation, but a classic was Pete the bird. I’m not entirely sure his name was Pete, as this was at least nine years ago. What I do remember for sure was that a management intern came on the scene. For whatever reason one day she brought a bird to the office and put it out where everyone could see it. The only other time I remember being around caged birds was when I was little and my Grandma Mary had one – well she had a few during my lifetime, but all I know is they were dirty, loud, and for some reason had to have a sheet over their cage at night.

I was never allowed to touch any of Grandma Mary’s birds, only look at them from a distance. When I was about 12 or so I visited Grandma Mary for this first time in two or three years. I’m not sure how it came about, but she decided that I must be mature enough to touch her bird, and so she allowed, at my request, a bird touching. I reached in to pet it, or let it climb on me or something and it flipped the heck out. Flapping all around, feathers flying – it was a mess. The next day that bird died, Grandma Mary insisted that I had given the bird a heart attack and killed it. I don’t know what I could have done differently, but evidently I offended that bird to the core.

Okay so back to Outdoor Recreation. I notice the bird in the cage, and likely as a result of my lack in childhood I ask if I can pet the bird. One thing leads to another and the bird is on my finger. I am thrilled that finally I have found a bird that likes me. The problem is the Pete liked me a little too much. My finger wasn’t enough; he clawed his way all the way up my arm to my shoulder where he sat perched for a few minutes. Then for whatever reason he made his way down my back. His little claws were hurting so I finally had to get down on all fours to make Pete level in hopes he would retract his claws. It worked; but the bird wouldn’t get off of me for anything. Finally after everyone in the room was in hysterics Kelly (the birds’ owner) forcefully removed the bird from my person and put him back in his cage.

My only assumption is that little Pete was mortally embarrassed by this escapade as future attempts to get him on my finger were failures. In fact Pete grew hostile towards me, over time squawking loudly at the mere sight of me. Everyone would wonder why when I walked in the room Pete would panic and freak out. Pete’s built up hostility and anger towards me grew and festered in to a distinct hatred for me. This bird would get out of control every time he saw me – eventually resorting to sharpening his beak at the sight of me just in case he needed to attack (given the opportunity I feel he may have).

Everyone just thought this was so funny, but I was a little offended. I finally asked Kelly “What should I do to regain Pete’s trust?” She replied “Just put your hand in there and let him climb on.” “Not a good idea,” I thought to myself. A few days later I came up with a solution – welders gloves. On this day I walk in to the office, and as usual Pete starts screaming, he runs over to his beak sharpening stone and begins ferociously sharpening to ensure epidermis penetration when he bites. But then much to his surprise I forgo my normal route far out of Pete’s sight, and instead set course straight for his cage.

He was most uncomfortable with my stand, and made his thoughts known, to keep me in sight he had to abandon his beak sharpening stone, and turn around, he then commenced the beak sharpening on the bars of the cage. This bird was crazy, I’m telling you. I don the gloves, open the door, and insert my gloved hand. It’s a good thing I wore the gloves; this plan did not work, Pete literally tore chunks out of the hard thick leather gloves. He really hated me, talk about bitter. I never again attempted to have interaction with Pete, and although over time he stopped being so vocal he would always commence beak sharpening at the mere sight of me.

Tonight back to New York for a delicious dinner before we must go back to reality (and hot humid weather) in Houston. HAVE A GREAT DAY!

Simple Instructions

We've all been there, we check in at the airport, the agent asks us to take our bags to the screening area and proceed to our gate. Well evidently an older woman in Sweden heard "Take yourself over to the screening area and lay down...."

An elderly woman had an unexpected layover while attempting to check in at Sweden’s main airport Tuesday. The 78-year-old woman misunderstood instructions and fell down a baggage chute after placing herself, rather than her bags, on the belt, AFP reported.
The woman, who was not named, was preparing to depart from Stockholm’s Arlanda Airport for Germany, when she lay down on the baggage belt thinking she was following the check-in instructions.
Staff members helped her catch her flight after she was swept off to the baggage handling center.

I wish I had been there to see it.

Amy and I were in NYC yesterday (one of Amy's favorite places in the whole world) - we had a great time, today we are going to a certain ice cream factory in Vermont, any guesses??