Merry Christmas everyone! I hope Santa Claus was good to you all and that you have a great day with family. I'm at the firehouse today, but that's ok. April and I have gotten to see just about everyone in the past few days, and that was a blast. We got back in late last night and I got up early for work, so I'm pretty pooped! So far today we've had a big breakfast, and that is about it. Hopefully it will stay that way too!
We had an absolute blast with everyone in Atlanta a few days ago. It was a ton of fun and I wish we could see each other more often.
I guess that's about it for now, everyone have a great day and I'll talk to you later.
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Monday, December 22, 2008
I'll write more later
But I saw this today and it gave me a pretty good laugh...
If this thing turns bad and you have to point your prayer rug to the east, don't blame me...I voted for McCain....
Sorry to get political, but I thought was a good turn on an old quote!
If this thing turns bad and you have to point your prayer rug to the east, don't blame me...I voted for McCain....
Sorry to get political, but I thought was a good turn on an old quote!
Friday, December 12, 2008
Check Please!
Well, April and I had a nice day. Her school was closed due to the weather, so about lunch time, when it was above 40* out and the plow trucks and salt trucks had run their routes, we decided to get out and about. Not sure why the schools needed closing, but hey, whatever. We really did have a nice day overall, getting caught up on shopping and hanging out, but man on man, did I ever mess up.
I went back to Wal*Mart. This time it was bad. Real bad. Sorry for the negative blog, but I was a bit miffed. Anyways, here we go.
I swear, this is probably only about the 5th time I've been there in calendar year 2008. I absolutely hate that place, and I will pay a little more to buy elsewhere. Don't ask me why, but that is just how I am.
At any rate, here's today's Wal*Mart story.
I was in the sporting goods section. The item I was looking at was directly next to the air rifles, etc. There is a scruffy (I'm being generous) man in a wheel chair next to his equally scruffy (politically correct enough?) looking wife(?). I can't help but overhear their discussion because they are having it loud enough for people in the parking lot to hear. They were having a problem April and I had shortly after we moved into our house; there were stray dogs coming around causing trouble. They were debating which particular pellet gun would be best for their problem. April and I bought the cheapest one we could find, and after only a few shots the dogs recognized it on sight and knew to run, and shortly thereafter knew to avoid our yard at all costs.
The debate is that they guy wants the expensive one, and his wife is uncertain if it will do the trick. The guy tells her that 'a .22 with rock salt would' well, I won't finish what he had to say, but sufice it to know he thought it would be suprememly effective. I was on the verge of relating my story to them, hoping to aid in their finding a cost effective solution to their situation (it is Christmas, afterall).
Then the following words came out of Scruffy Guy's mouth: "Course, you ain't a felon like me so you'll have to buy me dat gun." And with that, they turned to the gun counter and asked to see that little Marlin .22 behind the register. Check please. I'm glad I kept my mouth shut. I'm not sure what the rules are RE: pellet guns and felons, but I know my policy about getting involved with people attempting to commit a fresh one. Check Please! I'm outta here.
I briefly toyed with the thought of telling the lady at the counter about the man's admission of conviction, but again decided I was better off distancing myself from the whole situation. Besides, TN does a computerized background check on people wishing to purchase firearms (I assume that goes for all firearms, not just handguns, but I could be mistaken). Surely somewhere in that computer network would be a note about this lady hanging around with a known felon in a wheelchair right? Right?
Check Please. No more Wally World for this guy.
I went back to Wal*Mart. This time it was bad. Real bad. Sorry for the negative blog, but I was a bit miffed. Anyways, here we go.
I swear, this is probably only about the 5th time I've been there in calendar year 2008. I absolutely hate that place, and I will pay a little more to buy elsewhere. Don't ask me why, but that is just how I am.
At any rate, here's today's Wal*Mart story.
I was in the sporting goods section. The item I was looking at was directly next to the air rifles, etc. There is a scruffy (I'm being generous) man in a wheel chair next to his equally scruffy (politically correct enough?) looking wife(?). I can't help but overhear their discussion because they are having it loud enough for people in the parking lot to hear. They were having a problem April and I had shortly after we moved into our house; there were stray dogs coming around causing trouble. They were debating which particular pellet gun would be best for their problem. April and I bought the cheapest one we could find, and after only a few shots the dogs recognized it on sight and knew to run, and shortly thereafter knew to avoid our yard at all costs.
The debate is that they guy wants the expensive one, and his wife is uncertain if it will do the trick. The guy tells her that 'a .22 with rock salt would' well, I won't finish what he had to say, but sufice it to know he thought it would be suprememly effective. I was on the verge of relating my story to them, hoping to aid in their finding a cost effective solution to their situation (it is Christmas, afterall).
Then the following words came out of Scruffy Guy's mouth: "Course, you ain't a felon like me so you'll have to buy me dat gun." And with that, they turned to the gun counter and asked to see that little Marlin .22 behind the register. Check please. I'm glad I kept my mouth shut. I'm not sure what the rules are RE: pellet guns and felons, but I know my policy about getting involved with people attempting to commit a fresh one. Check Please! I'm outta here.
I briefly toyed with the thought of telling the lady at the counter about the man's admission of conviction, but again decided I was better off distancing myself from the whole situation. Besides, TN does a computerized background check on people wishing to purchase firearms (I assume that goes for all firearms, not just handguns, but I could be mistaken). Surely somewhere in that computer network would be a note about this lady hanging around with a known felon in a wheelchair right? Right?
Check Please. No more Wally World for this guy.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Ok, well, here we go
It's my turn to post a contest. This one will take a little effort, but it should provide a few laughs. Ready? Here we go.
The rules are as follows:
"You will need little instruction on how to follow this trail, since for the most part it follows the lakefront just above the water's edge. Initially, the trail leads down to the water and then follows one of the fingers of the lake for a while, up to the point where the Fern Trail Loop branches off to the left and heads back to the parking lot. If you continue on the Cub Creek Lake Trail another 0.5 mile or so, the Deer Trail, a 4-mile trail leading through the center of the undeveloped area of the Trace, will branch off to the left."
It goes on from there, but I won't bore ya haha. The book is 'Hiking Tennessee', which was given to me by my dad. I did cheat a little, the first book I came to was actually on a shelf with other books, but this one was grabbed at random (I turned my head, reached out, and this one came off first). I am glad I grabbed it though, I had forgotten about it and now is the time of year best for getting out (at least to me it is!).
Alright, let's see what you guys are reading!
The rules are as follows:
Open the nearest book to page 56. Write out the fifth sentence on that page, and also the next two to five sentences. The CLOSEST BOOK, NOT YOUR FAVORITE, OR MOST INTELLECTUAL! Be sure to tell us what book it is and how you came to be in possession of said book.MMMKKKAAAY, guess I gotta go first. I had to do a few quick laps around the room but here we go...
"You will need little instruction on how to follow this trail, since for the most part it follows the lakefront just above the water's edge. Initially, the trail leads down to the water and then follows one of the fingers of the lake for a while, up to the point where the Fern Trail Loop branches off to the left and heads back to the parking lot. If you continue on the Cub Creek Lake Trail another 0.5 mile or so, the Deer Trail, a 4-mile trail leading through the center of the undeveloped area of the Trace, will branch off to the left."
It goes on from there, but I won't bore ya haha. The book is 'Hiking Tennessee', which was given to me by my dad. I did cheat a little, the first book I came to was actually on a shelf with other books, but this one was grabbed at random (I turned my head, reached out, and this one came off first). I am glad I grabbed it though, I had forgotten about it and now is the time of year best for getting out (at least to me it is!).
Alright, let's see what you guys are reading!
Monday, December 8, 2008
Before this turns into the every third MONTH blog...
... I guess I'd better write something, huh?
It was great to see everyone at Thanksgiving, and I feel like I caught you guys up pretty good on what you'd missed since my last blog, so we'll just move on from here. Not much new to report, I'm halfway through my 2 week vacation, and I am thoroughly enjoying doing nothing at all other than puttering around the house and working on a few projects I have been neglecting. Hopefully with the remaining week I'll finish up with enough time left to get out and do some more hiking and enjoy the outdoors while the nice weather lasts! We have gotten some good rain, and a few snow flurries, and while I am certainly ready for much more of both, it has been perfect weather to be outside for the most part.
Saturday night April's parents were in town, so we had them over for dinner. I did some chili in my dutch oven out on the fire pit, and it turned out great. I have a few pictures of it from when I had made before, and since a blog just isn't complete without pictures, enjoy them!
Here it is cooking, I miscalculated the size of the fire pit so I had to continually turn the oven to avoid having one side get hotter than the other.
And of course every chef needs a sous chef, mine spent her afternoon trying to figure out how to get the good smelling stuff out without burning her little feet. Don't let that innocent face fool you, she is devious and made several attempts at the chili. The second time I cooked it she had learned her lesson and left it alone, even after I moved it out of the pit and let it sit on the ground to finish cooking.
The finished product:
(Actually, after I got it inside I added some cornmeal to it to make it a little thicker. It was awesome! The cornmeal was a perfect addition.)
As for what I am thankful for, I won't mention family and things like like, because everyone else has already hit on those. Instead, I 'm going to say that I am thankful for a family that is thankful (ok, so I worked family into it afterall, but you know what I mean =P ). To so many people the holidays just mean rush rush rush, hectic battles with crowds (both at home and at stores) and trying to one up themselves. Luckily both sides of my family (April's and mine) have a pretty firm grasp on what the holidays are really about. No one tries to one up anyone else, no one makes it about the gifts. Instead it is about the family and trying to find the time to get together and enjoy each other's company. I think that can be attributed to both sides having fairly large families (April has 3 brothers) and realizing that once you start to get spread out and have families of your own, it can be easy to miss all the good times and togetherness.
Having just said that, however, I just got back from doing a little Christmas shopping of my own. I think the people that I bought for will be quite pleased with their gifts. However, there is nothing that will wreck the Holiday Spirit like a trip to Wally World! I had a few items in my cart, and rather than try to push it down a crowded isle, I opted instead to leave it at the end and go get what I needed. By the time returned someone had taken the items out of my cart, put them back on the shelf, and put their own stuff in it! Then THEY abandoned the cart and went to grab something. I didn't see anyone in the vicinity, so I grabbed my items back off the shelf, emptied their stuff out, and reclaimed my cart. It didn't ding my spirit but I imagine they were peeved when they got back. As I further roamed the isles, I saw people fighting and arguing with each other over the most trivial things. Of course, this was the Wal*Mart in Columbia, TN, so that was par for the course. At least on this trip I didn't witness anything I thought I would have to testify in court over (haha).
Talk to you next time.
It was great to see everyone at Thanksgiving, and I feel like I caught you guys up pretty good on what you'd missed since my last blog, so we'll just move on from here. Not much new to report, I'm halfway through my 2 week vacation, and I am thoroughly enjoying doing nothing at all other than puttering around the house and working on a few projects I have been neglecting. Hopefully with the remaining week I'll finish up with enough time left to get out and do some more hiking and enjoy the outdoors while the nice weather lasts! We have gotten some good rain, and a few snow flurries, and while I am certainly ready for much more of both, it has been perfect weather to be outside for the most part.
Saturday night April's parents were in town, so we had them over for dinner. I did some chili in my dutch oven out on the fire pit, and it turned out great. I have a few pictures of it from when I had made before, and since a blog just isn't complete without pictures, enjoy them!
Here it is cooking, I miscalculated the size of the fire pit so I had to continually turn the oven to avoid having one side get hotter than the other.
And of course every chef needs a sous chef, mine spent her afternoon trying to figure out how to get the good smelling stuff out without burning her little feet. Don't let that innocent face fool you, she is devious and made several attempts at the chili. The second time I cooked it she had learned her lesson and left it alone, even after I moved it out of the pit and let it sit on the ground to finish cooking.
The finished product:
(Actually, after I got it inside I added some cornmeal to it to make it a little thicker. It was awesome! The cornmeal was a perfect addition.)As for what I am thankful for, I won't mention family and things like like, because everyone else has already hit on those. Instead, I 'm going to say that I am thankful for a family that is thankful (ok, so I worked family into it afterall, but you know what I mean =P ). To so many people the holidays just mean rush rush rush, hectic battles with crowds (both at home and at stores) and trying to one up themselves. Luckily both sides of my family (April's and mine) have a pretty firm grasp on what the holidays are really about. No one tries to one up anyone else, no one makes it about the gifts. Instead it is about the family and trying to find the time to get together and enjoy each other's company. I think that can be attributed to both sides having fairly large families (April has 3 brothers) and realizing that once you start to get spread out and have families of your own, it can be easy to miss all the good times and togetherness.
Having just said that, however, I just got back from doing a little Christmas shopping of my own. I think the people that I bought for will be quite pleased with their gifts. However, there is nothing that will wreck the Holiday Spirit like a trip to Wally World! I had a few items in my cart, and rather than try to push it down a crowded isle, I opted instead to leave it at the end and go get what I needed. By the time returned someone had taken the items out of my cart, put them back on the shelf, and put their own stuff in it! Then THEY abandoned the cart and went to grab something. I didn't see anyone in the vicinity, so I grabbed my items back off the shelf, emptied their stuff out, and reclaimed my cart. It didn't ding my spirit but I imagine they were peeved when they got back. As I further roamed the isles, I saw people fighting and arguing with each other over the most trivial things. Of course, this was the Wal*Mart in Columbia, TN, so that was par for the course. At least on this trip I didn't witness anything I thought I would have to testify in court over (haha).
Talk to you next time.
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