Star gazing

Clear skies on Friday nite and Saturday nite allowed great viewing of Saturn and the moon in the south, soutwestern sky and two globular clusters, M13 and M92, in the eastern sky near the constellation Hercules. Lotsa fun. Stayed up 'til after midnite on Friday. Mosquitoes chased us in the house tonite by 11. Cool stuff.

Office with a view

(You can click on the photos to see an enlarged view.)

I am working on a bank project in Edmond. The bank purchased an old building and is renovating it for the bank's corporate offices. The building was constructed in the early 1900's and was the depot for the trolley that ran between Edmond and Oklahoma City many years ago. Anyway, the bank's CEO will have his office in one corner of the renovated building. This will be CEO's view from one of his windows and a view from an adjacent office window. How would you like to stair at that group of nostrils all day? LMAO.

Trip to the Far East

I had to go to Tahlequah today with a client, Mike. A trip to the Far East... part of Oklahoma. I have worked on several projects with an architect from the Choctaw Nation. He works with the Creek, Cherokee and Chickasaw Nations, also. We are working on a new classroom building for Sequoyah High School in Tahlequah. The high school football stadium was constructed in the 1960's and the Cherokees want to replace it. They wanted me to inspect the stadium and let them know if there were any structural problems. Actually, I believe they were hoping I'd condemn it as unsafe. But that is not the case. There are some water leak issues, but the stadium is ok although it is old and not particularly aesthetically attractive. Kinda like most small high schools in Oklahoma. About a five hour round trip for a two hour inspection.

I forgot how great that part of Oklahoma really is. Beautiful country.

Mike and I stopped at a Mexican restaurant for lunch after the inspection. There was a family having lunch. As we walked by their table, I waved at a little boy about Oliver's age. After we ordered, I looked toward that table and the little guy was staring at me. I waved again and he grinned really big. Kinda cute.

Debbie's supervisor was out of the office today and tomorrow. She made Debbie acting supervisor while she's out. Debbie said three people called in sick. LOL. I told Debbie she's too big a hard ass compared to her supervisor and the other workers didn't want to work there. That's not true really, because Debbie is easy to get along with and her coworkers like her alot.

Watching a history channel show on jellyfish. Strange creatures. I didn't know that box jellyfish were deadly to humans. I didn't know they have eyes. One of the scientists is convinced the jellyfish stalk their prey. whoa.

Have a good one.

Cool clouds

Debbie went to Wally World to get some food for Megan since she is still having some pain and difficulty eating. When Debbie got back home, she came into the house and told me to go outside and check out some cool clouds. She wasn't kidding about them being cool. I wonder if this is a thunderstorm brewing? The setting sun really created some lovely shadows, don't ya think?

I can't believe I used the word "lovely". dang.

Lazy Sunday

A few more photos of Zeppelin playing

Today was a good day. We lazed around most of the day. Debbie made a great breakfast: breakfast casserole and fresh fruit. That casserole is awesome. Watermelon, cantelope, blueberries, strawberries, grapes... mmm.

Early afternoon was cookout time. Debbie made some German potato salad. Yum. Cooked some burgers, brats, Polish sausages and weiners on the grill. Debbie made her Mexican caviar and guacamole. Relish trays with fresh veggies, pickles, and olives stuffed with jalapenos. Purty good feed!!!

Kelsey spent the afternoon with us and brought Zeppelin to visit. Took him out back while I was cooking the burgers. The neighbor has a couple of small dogs that were barking at Zeppelin. He was kind of freaking out, then decided he needed to bark at the smaller dogs through the fence. Then he started clumsily running around the back yard like dogs do when they get excited. Hilarious. Especially with that thing on his head. Guess that comes off in a couple of days.

Watching that Will Smith movie, Seven Pounds. Saw the previews a few months ago and read some reviews. Not sure what kind of movie it's supposed to be.

Have a good evening.

Rings of Saturn

Clear skies tonite allowed me, Debbie, Megan and Shawn to see the rings of Saturn. Very cool.

The Lego

In January, Debbie bought a new Bosch dishwasher to replace the Kenmore we bought a couple of years ago. The pump went out on the Kenmore. The Bosch has not worked well ever since it was installed. Not cleaning well. Not draining well. The repairman has been to the house more than once to look at the dishwasher. The appliance store owner contacted Bosch trying to determine a solution as to why the dishwasher was functioning so poorly. Last week, the dishwasher simply would not finish draining about 2 inches of water. Debbie was ready to have the appliance store take back the dishwasher and get the Kenmore pump replaced. Yesterday, the repairman came to the house to replace the pump on the Bosch dishwasher thinking that the new dishwasher pump was defective for some reason. When he removed the drain hose from the garbage disposal, he noticed that the hose was full of water. Knowing that was very odd, he somehow maneuvered his tall self under the cabinet enough to shine a light into the short section of pipe on the disposal. He saw noodle fragments... and a tiny spot of dayglow green. Somehow, a tiny piece of Lego was lodged in that pipe. The pipe was almost completely blocked. The repairman had to use a screwdriver and hammer to punch the Lego out of the pipe because it was lodged so tight in the pipe. The Lego has been there since we moved in. Who knows how long the Lego has been in there? The repairman removed the Lego and as far as we can tell so far, the dishwasher is working OK. Debbie isn't ready to say the dishwasher is working properly yet, but we have a feeling things will be good. That Lego is the reason the pump went out on the Kenmore. A plastic toy that likely costs no more than a penny ruined one dishwasher and almost ruined another. Deb will use the dishwasher for a few days. If it cleans like it should, I am writing a apology letter to the appliance store and giving the repairman a bonus. He could have simply replaced the pump. Incredible.

Have a good day.

The dog with the red fez

Kelsey brought the Great Dane puppy, Zeppelin, for a visit. He has a fez looking device on his head to make his ears pointy.

101 uses for frozen peas

Use #1. Freeze your cheeks. hee hee

No more wisdom teeth

Wonder why those teeth way in the back of your mouth are called wisdom teeth. They don't do anything but cause trouble. Megan had four removed this morning. She's doing alot of sleeping right now.

At the surgery center not long after she had the teeth removed, Megan was in a recovery room with a mouth full of gauze. And trying to talk. Kinda hard to understand her. Megan asked to see her teeth, but since she didn't ask before the surgery the surgeon had already tossed them in the biohazard waste container. I told her we could find a big ole horse tooth like Danny did for Tara many years ago. Can't remember why that happened, tho. Anyway, Megan's eyes were watering alot because of the anethesia. She kept wiping them with tissues. She tried to get a tissue to stay on her eye and it fell off a few times. Suddenly, Megan had the tissue on her finger and jabbed herself in the eye trying to get the tissue to stick. I was laughing and Megan said, "I'm gonna hit you with a soggy one." But with all the gauze in her mouth, it sounded like, "I wanna eat two froggy buns." Or something weird like that. Debbie told Megan I was gonna have some good stuff for the blog. Megan raised up with a weird look on her face to see if I had a video camera. LOL. Wish I had one cuz she looked funny.

Hopefully, she'll feel better soon.

Big ole boat

Debbie and I had dinner at Golden Corral tonite. Must have been Cajun food nite. They had jambalaya, dirty rice, gumbo and some other stuff. The jambalaya was pretty good. Debbie got a nice piece of sirloin. Good dinner.

Went back to the office and worked til almost 10. Debbie played online games while I worked. She talked to Tara, Evie and Maggie on the phone, too.

On the way home, we passed a pickup with a huge v-bottom boat in the back. Over half the boat was hanging out the back of the truck. Dunno where Noah was going with his boat, but hope he made it home before the boat fell out.

Gonna go get some shuteye.

Have a good one.

what a DAY!

Man, today has been a scramble. I'm helping a contractor with a floor vibration problem. They are constructing a 2 story building. It's not yet finished but all of the structural stuff is complete. The owner stopped by and visited the site. While a worker was pushing a huge stack of material across the floor, the owner noticed the floor vibrating. Freaked him out and he demanded a vibration study. I agreed to help the contractor thinking it might take a day's work. Since mid-April, I've spend almost 2 weeks on it. No good deed ever goes unpunished. I turned in what I thought was a final design yesterday afternoon. The engineer of record made comments that I've spent all day frantically taking care of so I can take tomorrow off to be with Megan and Deb since Megan is getting her wisdom teeth removed. Taking a break right now, but getting ready to get back after it.

Had planned to take the whole weekend off. But after spending so much time on the vibration deal, I'm way behind on a couple of jobs. Need to work Saturday for sure. Gads.

Anyway, the weather is great. No rain!! Well, there is a chance this weekend. Tara will hopefully get to come for a visit this weekend, pending Evie getting better and the other two munchkins not getting sick. Tara and John have their hands full o' little ones. Just when I think I'm gonna have a nite or two to stay up late and look thru the new telescope, there's a chance of rain. daggonit.

Have a great evening.

As Evie would say...

Rememberies.

Nice day again today. Sure is golfing weather. Or fishing. Or anything but workin'.

Listening to the radio this morning and they were talking about S&H green stamps. I remember mom getting those when we lived in Colorado. When she'd get a bunch of them, she'd have us kids sit around the table and lick the stamps so she could put them in the books. I don't know what she ever bought, but I remember licking alot of those stamps.

The radio folks were talking about alot of stuff from the "good ole days". I remember a brand of powder laundry soap that mom would buy and there was a towel in the box. She ended up with a pile of hand or dish towels, whatever they were. The radio folks said the detergent was Breeze. I don't recall the brand name, but I remember seeing mom pull a towel out of the box. I don't remember this, but the radio folks were talking about getting glasses out of oatmeal boxes. The glasses had Porter Wagoner, Dolly Parton and other stuff on them. Guess we didn't eat the fancy oatmeal when I was a kid.

She used to have a bunch of small glasses that were used for pimento cheese spread. Mom also had several glasses that she bought full of jelly. They were pretty good dinner glasses. 'Course, you had to wash the jelly out of them first.

I remember going to the A&W rootbeer drive-in. Back in the days when A&W wasn't part of Long John Silvers. Debbie used to work at the one in Miami during the summer. I remember going there as a kid and a girl waiting on us. I wish I could recall if it was Debbie.

Hee hee. I just realized I'm doing "I remember when..." stuff. I can truly say there are some places in this state where buildings are now located and I remember when it was all a field. LOLOL. Kinda goes along with being a structural engineer and building stuff, huh?

We stopped at the grocery store as we got into town tonite on the way home from work. Debbie bought some groceries, including a watermelon. When we got home, Megan had just pulled into the driveway from working at Rib Crib. Debbie was talking to Megan as I unloaded a couple of bags. The watermelon was in one bag. I put the bags on the driveway so I could lock the car doors. I saw something moving and looked down. The watermelon was rolling down the driveway! Those things can scoot. Debbie asked, "Don't engineers know better than to put round things on a sloping surface?" Um, guess not before it happened but I know now that watermelons can roll really well.

Have a good evening.

Happy Birthday John

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Joooooohnnnn. Happy birthday to you. There are usually several other versus known only by the Wojahn clan such as "many more" and "you look like a monkey and smell like one too." waitaminnit. That last one might not be a Wojahn verse. Anyway, happy 31st.

I like your aluminum foil office, by the way. LOL There are some odd looking items in there. What's that desktop photo, anyway? hee hee.

Lungful of bug

I mowed our lawn last nite after Debbie and I went to graze at one of the local Chinese buffets. Debbie was hungry for sushi and I talked her into going to the buffet instead of the more expensive sushi restaurant, Kyotos. Usually, the buffet has good California rolls, which is what Debbie really likes. But, it turned out not to be a good nite for buffet sushi. Anyway, back to the yard mowing. It has rained so much the last few weeks, the back yard is pretty much a miniature equivalent of the Everglades. There is a puddle of brackish looking water standing at the south end. I didn't see a gator, but something left some huge footprints around the edge of it. And those ain't my footprints. There is a very damp section of soil about 6 feet wide running down the middle of the yard starting at the brackish water and extending to the other end of the yard. My feet were sinking into the soil with every step I took while pushing the mower. Apparently, gnats and other small flying insects like living in that sort of wetland. As I pushed the mower through that damp section, a huge swarm flew up out of the grass just as I took in a breath of swamp gas. It was either swamp gas or flatulence. At my age, I'm unsure so I'm calling swamp gas. Anyhoo, I believe I inhaled about half the swarm. I've been coughing off and on all day after I get a ticklish feeling in my throat. I coughed a few minutes ago and I swear a gnat flew off. Not kidding. I don't see it flying around... but... I ain't worried about swine flu, but is there such a thing as swarm flew? flu. flew. anyway... And those footprints kinda bothered me. Until I remembered that the meter reader jumps the fences between yards while reading meters. I bet the splash down was a surprise to him. LOL

good stuff

Debbie and I eat at Carino's on a regular basis. One of my favorite dishes is the spicy shrimp and chicken dinner. Penne pasta, sundried tomatoes, shrimp, chicken, cayenne pepper, mushrooms, romano cream sauce. yummy. Debbie makes it at home on occasion. I believe she uses alfredo sauce. I really don't know the difference between alfredo and romano sauces. I do know both of the dishes are very tasty. Debbie made some of it on Saturday. Yummy. Just ate leftovers for lunch. Yummy.

We took Debbie's CX9 to the body shop this morning to have the hail damage repaired. Hope it comes back ok. Deb kinda freaked out yesterday when I told her they will have to remove the headliner to remove some of the dents. Her car has taken a beating since we bought it two years ago. The day we picked up the car, the dealer had not cleaned the car. They asked us to take the car back the following week. When we took the car back to the dealership to have them clean it up, the dealership guys put a dent in a door somehow. Within a few days after getting it back after the detailing, someone at her office slammed their door into hers. Left a dent in the driver's side door. A motorcycle hit Debbie a few months after we got it. Now the hail. Makes ya think it might be better to drive a junker so you don't have to worry about it getting messed up.

We have a bunch of sunshine today. Cool, but not cold, temps this morning. High should be in the mid-to-upper 70's. Man, this is nice weather. Hope it holds out til after the weekend.

Have a good one.

Play Ball!

Tara and John took their family to a Texas Rangers game and apparently had a blast. I love going to baseball games and especially enjoy listening to radio broadcasts of games. Debbie goes with me to OSU baseball home games as often as we can. We went to almost every game last year. Didn't make it to a single game this year.

There is a collegiate baseball team in McKinney. The McKinney Marshals The players are still in college but playing summer ball for the experience. In the past, some OSU and OU players have played in McKinney. Anyway, going to watch teams like this is alot cheaper than a Rangers game. Tara, we need to go watch these guys sometime this summer. They play June thru August. $4 for adults and kids under 5 are free.

The Marshals play in the Texas Collegiate League, which has teams in Kilgore (East Texas Pumpjacks), Coppell (Copperheads), Bryan near College Station (Brazos Valley Bombers), Victoria near San Antonio (Victoria Generals).

I can smell the fresh cut grass, hot dogs, and popcorn. mmmm.

A "roadable" aircraft

This is cool. Just read about it in a civil engineering magazine.
Kinda James Bond-ish.

Terrafugia Transition

Whattaya call a guy with no...?

Wow, what a week!!! In February, we were freakin' out about not having any work and thought we might have to lay-off the guys in the office. Not something I looked forward to really, as I've been through that more than once. Although, one of the guys is not really the brightest yahoo in the world and it could have been a blessing in the long run to lose some deadwood. But anyway, by the end of March, work had picked up. By mid-April, it was nuts. Now, it's nuttier than squirrel poo. Work is coming from all directions and everyone wants us to be finished last week. I've joked for years that we need to install a drive-thru window. I've taken one day off in the last 3 weeks. Mothers Day. Gads. Gotta make hay while the sun shines, or whatever that saying is. Or is it, gotta make like horse poop and hit the trail? No, I think it's the hay makin' one. Whatevah.

Megan went to Midland again on Wednesday. She'll be there until Sunday.

Debbie is having fits with her new dishwasher. Word of recommendation here: avoid Bosch dishwashers. The one we have doesn't work worth a darn. Other than it is very quiet compared to the old Kenmore, nothing else is as advertised. If the dishes are dirty when you put them in the appliance, they come out dirty sometimes... but with different dirt. If the dishes are not too dirty when you put them in the appliance, they come out looking dirty. Dunno where the stuff comes from, but there is often gritty stuff on the dishes. I think it might be minerals in the water, but not sure. Debbie put some dishes in it the other day, some with spaghetti sauce, and some of the plasticware came out tinted orange. What the...?? Anyway, never had that problem with the Kenmore. The Kenmore was noisy but cleaned really well til the pump went out. Shoulda spent the $250 for a new pump instead of $700 for a Bosch.

Funny post on Tara's blog about animal names. Evie and Maggie renamed their cats Lula and Rovert. LOL. Where do kids come up with names like that? I made a comment on her blog and made me think of some jokes the kids used to get a kick out of... the "whattaya call a guy with no arms and legs...?" If you have more, post them in the comments section.

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs laying on the beach?
Bernie.

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs laying in a hole in the back yard? Doug.

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs laying in the garden?
Pete Moss

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs on a woman’s head?
Brett.

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs in a safe?
Will.

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs on the side of a mountain?
Cliff.

What do you call a deer with no eyes?
I have no idea. (I have no eye deer).

What do you call a deer with no legs and no eyes?
I have still no idea. (I have still no eye deer)

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs being pulled behind a boat?
Skip.

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs in a tree?
Russell.

What do you call a two guys with no arms and no legs hanging on the living room wall?
Curt and Rod.

What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs stuck in a computer?
Chip.

What do you call a woman with one arm and one leg?
Ilene.

What do you call a Chinese woman with one arm and one leg?
Irene.

What do you call a guy with one arm and one leg who has to urinate?
Pierre.

Special Olympics are in Stillwater right now. Lots of people milling around. Buses and stuff. Some folks don't know where they need to go, so they just go. We almost got ran over by some lady last night who started to go straight through an intersection and about halfway through, decided to turn left... directly at us. Yikes. At least she waved. Debbie gave her the "dofer." You know, where you wave your index finger in the air cuz it will "do fer" the middle finger. hee hee.

Three guys enter a disabled swimming contest. The first has no arms. The second no legs and the third has no body, just a head. They all line up, the whistle blows and "splash" they're all in the pool.

The guy with no arms takes the lead instantly but the guy with no legs is closing fast. The head of course sank straight to the bottom. Ten lengths later and the guy with no legs finishes first. He can still see bubbles coming from the bottom of the pool, so he decides he had better dive down to rescue him. He picks up the head, swims back up to the surface and places the head at the side of the pool, whereupon the head starts coughing and spluttering.

Eventually the head catches his breath and shouts: "Three years I've spent learning to swim with my damn ears, then two minutes before the whistle, some asshole puts a swimming cap on me!"

oops.

Well, I'd better stop goofing off and get back to work. Have a good day.

Jeff-fuh-fuh Dun-HAM

Last Saturday, Debbie, Megan, Kelsey and I went to OKC and saw Jeff Dunham in concert. It was an hilarious couple of hours. He did Achmed the Dead Terrorist (Silence! I keel you!), Peanut (Jeff-fuh-fuh), Jose Jalapeno (on a steek), Walter (Shut the hell up) and Bubba J (his two loves are his country, his beer and NASCAR).

We tried to go to Toby Keith's restaurant for dinner before the show, but it was packed and the wait was over an hour. So, we went to a very ritzy place not far from Debbie's office. Golden Corral. Rubber steak. Rubber popcorn shrimp. yum. Actually, it's pretty good. The guy working around the tables was about 7 feet tall. Said he was a bald headed Macaulay Culkin look-a-like. Um, yeah. He got one thing right. He kept telling Megan he thought she looked like someone he knew. Since he knew she went in the restaurant alot, he'd figure it out. Um, yeah. That was the first time Megan ever went in there. He thought Kelsey looked like someone from The Hills. Not sure what that meant. Beverly Hills or the Ozarks? hmmm. I'm guessing since Kelsey has more than one tooth, it must not have been the Ozarks. But ya never know.

We made it to the Golden Corral and back to the Cox Center before we would have been seated and finished eating at Toby Keith's. We got just as good a meal and paid alot less for it. Turned out to be a good nite. Good food. Good show. Excellent company.

What's that noise?

Megan is moving back into the house. Semester is over and the couple she's living with are moving to another house. The living room is full of clothes, plastic containers and Debbie's favorite item for moving stuff: trash bags. LOL. After we unloaded the car of everything, we were sitting around the living room deciding if we wanted to go eat or go get the last load of stuff. Debbie heard a tapping noise. Couldn't tell where it was coming from. I was listening to the OSU baseball game on the radio, so I turned down the radio. Still couldn't figure out where the noise was coming from. Debbie was sitting on the recliner and said the noise sounded it was coming from the couch where Megan and I were sitting. The noise also sounded like buzzing and tapping together. I thought it sounded like the noise was coming from Debbie's side of the room. I turned off the ceiling fan and the noise sounded like it was coming from outside. I went outside, but it wasn't out there. It kinda sounded like the noise was coming from the corner, but when I went to the corner it sounded like the noise was elsewhere. I went to the fireplace and could tell the noise was behind me. I moved back and forth across the room until I could tell the noise was in one of the trash bags. I leaned down and could tell it was in the bag. I touched the side of the bag and it was, um, vibrating. I asked what was in the bag. Megan started cracking up and said she knew what it was. Debbie started to ask what it was and then said, "Oh." I asked if it was a feminine device of some sort. Megan was laughing really hard by now and nodded. Yikes. Debbie pulled it out of the bag. It was definitely a female device. Buzzing. Moving around. Good grief. Megan got it as a gag (appropriately) gift at one of those girl-only parties she and Kelsey went to a few months ago. Of course, she denies ever using it. Whatevah. It was pretty funny, especially when Debbie is standing in the middle of the living room holding it by the cord like it was a trophy fish or something while Megan is doubled over laughing on the couch. hee hee. Good laugh for the day.

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to Debbie, Tara, Eleanor, Lillian, Stephanie, Katie and any other Moms that are reading this.

"ism's"

Interesting political cartoon created 50 years ago by Harding College. Takes about 10 minutes of your time to watch, but very interesting. Especially the last minute or so. Makes a person give pause and really consider the reality of what's going on in Washington DC right now. How much "freedom" are we losing with the federal government taking over parts of the banking and automotive industry, temporary control or not? Are we truly "free" if the government controls so many aspects of our lives? If we let the government control a business now to save us from economic disaster later, when will the government return control to private industry? Will government ever return control to private industry? Will health care really be better if the government controls how we use that system? I have to wonder how good the health care will be when it's provided or subsidized by the same government that is supposed to take care of the highways and bridges we drive on every day.

Have a good one.

Drugstore cowboys

Drugstore robberies are a problem in Washington state. I wonder how big a problem it is elsewhere in the country. Some pharmacists in Seattle are packing heat to defend themselves. I wonder if a certain pharmicist in Carl Junction is packin'?

Fryday

Do you know what day of the week that is most hated by chickens? Today. 'Cause it is Fry Day. hee hee.

Anyone ever listen to or see the comedienne, Etta May? She's a hoot. She was on the Bob and Tom radio show this morning talking about her son, the musician. Apparently he is in an orchestra. The Lexington Philharmonic. Etta May said she wanted to see her son play in the band and wanted to meet his boss, Phil. She said something along the lines of, the music was good but she was disappointed that Phil didn't play his harmonica. hee hee. Phil... harmonica... philharmonic. hee hee hee... hee ... ha. hmmm.

On a serious note. Kinda behind on the news a little so don't know when this happened, but a woman had a press conference the other day as the first person in the US to have a face transplant. Wow. That's some incredible stuff. Hope all is ok in the long run for her.

Have you ever clicked on "Next Blog" at the top of the blog page? Sometimes, it takes you to some wierd stuff. whoa.

Have a good Friday.

Free dinner

Last week, Debbie and I went to Carino's for our weekly fix. There was a glob of chocolate on the edge of the table from the previous diners. Debbie stuck her arm in the chocolate and it was on her sweater sleeve. She tried to get it out at the restaurant but couldn't. She talked to the manager and he offered to buy her dinner if she couldn't get the stain out. As it turns out, she was able to get the stain out. Tonite, we went back to Carino's for our weekly fix. The manager saw us and waved. He stopped by the table and asked Debbie if she got the stain out of her sweater. She told him yes and he said, "Well, good. I'm buying your dinner tonite." And he did. For both of us. Nice way to end the day.

BBQ, the moon, skeeters and such

Debbie made some BBQ chicken, scalloped potatoes and baked beans last nite. That might be the best BBQ sauce ever. Very good.

We had clear skies last nite for the first time in forever. Took the telescope outside. Man, I gotta practice with this thing. It's not a point and look kind of deal. Takes some work to align it with something so it can be viewed thru the scope. Either that or I'm a dork. More than usual anyway. It took me quite awhile to get it lined up to look at the moon. It was hot. The back yard was swampish after all the rain. And the skeeters were feasting big time on my lard-ass body. There was a bat flying around, too. It wasn't eating near enough skeeters to keep them off me. When I finally had enough of them, I went inside. Deb saw one still feasting on my cheek. Man, when they find tender white meat they don't stop their vampirish ways just cuz the meat is moving around. Anyway, I'll get some skeeter repellent and try again. Gonna have to do some research on how to get better at pointing that telescope at stuff. I finally was able to look at the moon through it. One thing for sure, the moon is really bright when magnified. I think I burned a retina. I tried to look at Saturn. I believe I saw every star around it, but never did get Saturn through the eyepiece before the skeeters chased me off. I wonder if Galileo had any problems with skeeters, bats and pointing the telescope at Saturn? Seeing as how he was probably the first person to look through a telescope, he didn't know what he was looking at.

More rain forecast for tonite and the weekend. dangit.

Have a good one.

Whoppers

At the risk of repeating myself, the person who invented Whoppers deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. Two young high school gals stopped by this morning selling Whoppers to help pay for cap and gowns. Could have been a scam, but they dangled the proper bait to lure me into donating. Said they will be getting peanut butter and strawberry Whoppers in a couple of days. I heard someone say, "Stop back by." The voice sounded familiar, but it was difficult to determine over the sound of crunching Whoppers.

What the heck is that?

Another dreary beginning to the day. Clouds. Drizzled all the way from Stillwater to OKC. Temperatures are kinda cool in the mid-50s. I went outside to get some lunch and saw something very strange in the sky. What's that blue stuff? Wonder if that's some of that global warming I keep hearing about. Well, the rain has stopped for a bit. Maybe the blue represents something good. We shall see.

UPDATE: I believe we are experiencing a super nova. OMG!!! It's so BRIGHT!!!

Dinner with Kelsey

We planned to take Kelsey out for dinner tonite for her birthday. But, Kelsey was supposed to work tonite. She called me this morning and said someone agreed to take her shift so she could get off work earlier. Didn't know for sure what time she'd get off though. Debbie and I decided to go have dinner at Rib Crib so we could at least see Kelsey and give her a birthday card. Megan showed up at the house just as we are leaving for work this morning. She had been up all nite studying for a test this afternoon. I guess she thought it would be better to nap at our house than hers. Anyway, Megan said she'd go eat BBQ with us. Megan called me at work this afternoon and asked what time we'd be home. One of her friends was having a surprise party for her husband and wanted Megan to go. So, Megan was trying to figure out how to do both. I told her that Kelsey might get off work earlier than expected. Megan and Kelsey talk and decided we'd all wait 'til Friday to do dinner for Kelsey's birthday. I worked 'til about 5:30 then went to pick up Debbie. As we are on the way home, Kelsey calls and said she didn't have to work because another worker showed up to take her shift, allowing Kelsey to go home. So, Kelsey wanted to know when we'd be home so we could all go to dinner together. By that time, Megan is off doing her thing with her friend's party. Dang. And you all wonder why I can't keep up with what's going on sometimes!!! Keeping up with y'all is like trying to catch a feather in a tornado. Instead of Opie, I wanna be called Da Shroom. I'm kept in the dark and fed BS anyway. hee hee.

Anyway, we did have dinner with Kelsey and Eric (Kelsey's boyfriend) at Texas Roadhouse. Without Megan, who called while we were having dinner wondering what we were doing. Eric didn't eat because he ate earlier, not knowing Kelsey was getting off work early. He sat there watching us. Exciting I'm sure. Debbie got a Dallas Filet. It was undercooked so she sent it back. It was overcooked when it got back to the table. Kelsey wouldn't agree to let the Roadhouse folks make her sit on a saddle and announce to the restaurant it was her birthday. Party pooper.

They call that studying???

Now I know where Megan and Kelsey were on Monday nite. Participating in a FLASH RAVE at the OSU student union... INSTEAD OF STUDYING!!!!

LOL. I think Kelsey is the person wearing the yellow chicken head (or whatever that is) milling around at the right side of the crowd. Well, it's hard to tell who is who. But that's something she would probably do. Hilarious. Check out all of the other videos of the rave. Some of these kids need to learn how to take video. jeez. I got seasick watching a couple of them. LOL

Happy Birthday, Kelsey

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Kelsey... happy birthday to you. The youngest monk is 19 years old today. On this day in 1990, Debbie was preparing a pot of chicken soup and kept complaining about what she thought were labor pains. Since she had labor induced with Tara and Megan, naturally occurring labor pains were a new experience. So we tried to time the pains, figuring if the pains got closer together timewise, we'd head to the hospital. Um, that didn't work. She'd have a pain. 15 minutes later another. 5 minutes after that, another. Then wait another 15 minutes. Wait about 10 minutes and have another pain. Were we supposed to average the times? Finally, Deb decided we should go and see what the doc thought was happening. We called Mona and asked her to come over to stay with Tara and Megan. Deb and I went to the hospital. I took Deb to the maternity ward and the nurse checked her. We were there about 10 minutes and I said I was going to registration to check Debbie into the hospital. The nurse said I didn't have time. Kelsey was born within about 20 minutes after we arrived at the hospital. One of the nurses told Deb to come to the hospital as soon as she had a pain with the next child and not cut it so close. Deb said Kelsey was the last one, so it didn't matter. In all the excitement, we forgot to put the chicken soup in the frig and I had to toss it out.

Kelsey has two final exams today and has to work tonite. So much for a life lesson on your birthday being just another day, more or less.

It's raining again today. When did Oklahoma start having a monsoon season? I wanna play with my telescope, dammit!!! arrggghhh.

Have a good day.

Monday

Good morning. Finally, a morning without rain. Shortlived apparently as the forecast calls for more rain tomorrow. One of these days, I'll get to play with the new telescope. Kinda hard to do much when it's cloudy.

Did anyone see the story about the airplane that crashed into the porta potties? Good thing the crash site was a storage facility for the portable toilets. Can you imagine being in one of them taking care of business and the plane hits the outhouse? Dang. Hitting that site made it easy for the pilot to finish pooping his pants after the crash.

Debbie stayed home today. Feeling nauseous. Hope it's from the strawberries she ate last nite instead of being that swine flu stuff. Not that I want her to be sick at all, but being ill from slightly overripe strawberries is better than the flu.

Finals week for Megan and Kelsey. Good luck. Megan has one more year to go. She will graduate from OSU next May. Wow. Time is flying.

Have a good day.

UPDATE: I'm kinda behind on some news. Just read about the collapse of the Dallas Cowboys training center. Someone was taking video during the practice and caught the chaos of the collapse. Interesting that the lights were swaying around before the collapse. One of the assistant coaches is paralyzed from the waist down. It will be interesting to see the investigation reports. The building should have been designed to resist 90 mph winds. Reports indicate the winds were around 70 mph. Building should have been ok.

Superheroes

Sometimes, we all need a guardian angel. Not the spiritual kind. The real kind. Like Spiderman coming to rescue us just before the el-train runs off the end of the track into the river. Or Superman swooping in to catch us just before we hit the ground after falling 120 stories off the skyscraper. Or maybe, just a guy like us but dressed as a... fox. Otherwise known as, Firefox. He (?) lives in Michigan. Or, the Black Arrow from the United Kingdom. Or, The Eye from California. What about Captain Jackson from Michigan? Looks like he modified a Batman costume, but hey, he's fighting crime. And he didn't ask for the job. It just sorta happened. Really? The suit was on the front porch one morning and you felt compelled to put it on? dun dun dun... Captain Jackson!!

I especially like the superheroes who have arch enemies. Like Tothian, Knight Errant from New Jersey. Not sure what a Knight Errant is. Some kind of title with "errant" in it sounds sort of... well, out of the ordinary. Makes sense when you think about being a superhero. Anyway, his arch enemies are Omar Al-Bashir and Osama Bin Laden. Um, dude. I think those guys are most everyones' arch enemies. You need to be watching out for the 12 year old sneaking up behind you trying to give you a power wedgie for wearing your jammies during the day.

Another favorite is Angel Grinder Man from England. He patrols the streets and night looking for cars that have been wheel-clamped. Ever seen those strange devices clamped on a wheel of a parked car? Well, this guy looks for them and uses a big tool to cut the clamp off the car. Nifty costume, fella.

Some of the costumes are interesting. The Red Arrow from Hong Kong. Red arrow on his head pointing behind him. Red arrow on his chest pointing down. Wonder if he's the superhero for the directionally challenged.

Polar Man has a shovel and he is not afraid to use it. Shoveling snow from sidewalks and whatnot. Wonder if he uses it to shovel poo?

Some of the names are interesting. Shadow Hare. Citizen Prime. Green Scorpion. Nostrum. Superhero. Yeah, that guy put alot of thought into that one. But hey, he has a cool car. Superbarrio. I think he might be a retired wrassler. Doktor DiscorD. Wonder if he is Doktor Kaboom on weekends? Nix. Mr. Silent. Is he a crimefighting mime? He'd help but he's stuck in that darned box again.

Anyway, have fun checking that out. I'm thinking about having a superhero name. Maybe "The Farter". dun dun dun... oops, 'scuse me.

What would your superhero name be?

World Superhero Registry