Love Them Dearly!

I love them dearly, but come Sunday...

Mom comes to pick them up and I've truly never been happier to see my daughter. We did have fun.

Went to Burlington City Park Saturday afternoon. Rode the train twice. Carousel three times. Planes, trains, boats and automobiles...they rode them all. Stopped at Wendy's on the way home for chicken nugget kids meals with small frostys. A necessity after a hot day in the park I was told.

Today (Sunday) I showed them the shed out back, just in case the next time they come to stay they'd know where they could end up IF they were to misbehave! While we were in there we just happened to find two old super-soaker squirt guns. So, out came the bathing suits and we had a good time with those. And, of course, being the considerate Pops that I am, I sent them home with these two new treasures with instructions on how to ambush their parents with them!

But after they left...

The silence. The sound of it was just so wonderful!! I actually had a ringing in my ears the same as I did after a Springsteen concert back in the '80s. I just sat in my office, lights out, ceiling fan on high and listened to it. Listened to that beautiful silence. For a half an hour. Silence.

Bless their hearts...but...oh that silence felt good!

Still Kickin'

I've been negligent of my blogging duties. Having returned safely "off of the mountain" it's been chores, lists and honey do's.

Now my lovely bride is off to the beach for a few days and I'm here at home unsupervised. Well, not really. I'm actually being babysat on by my five year old grandaughter Olivia and her two and three quarters year old brother Paxton.

And a fine job they're doing! They "let" me stay up til 11:30pm last night after feeding me lots and lots of junk food! Then they made sure I didn't oversleep this morning and miss the beautiful sunrise so they woke me at 6:25am! Wow!! My lovely bride must be paying these two pretty well for babysitting Pops.

If I could only untie these ropes around my wrists and ankles. Hey...guys...are those my car keys you're walking out the door with?! Guys...HEY YOU GUYS!!





-- Post From My iPhone 3G

Flashback

When my lovely bride told me about our son's three day college orientation and how we had the "opportunity" to stay in our own dorm room while we were attending I thought, yea, why not. Could be fun. Might resurrect some great old college memories. Six pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon. Break out the old bong (just kidding! Never did anything like that!!)

But I guess I didn't REALLY think it would be exactly like it was back then. After all, we were under the impression that the dorm we would be spending this three day get away was something like married student housing. Wrongo! Here I lie in my extra long institutional dorm bed with a lumpy hard institutional mattress on the other side of the room from my lovely bride and her extra long institutional dorm bed with a lumpy hard institutional mattress. The single fluorescent light fixture in the middle of the popcorn white ceiling just adds insult to injury. No TV. No radio. Bare walls. No Pabst Blue Ribbon beer.

Good night dear! Hell, she's already asleep.


-- Post From My iPhone 3G

Childis Interuptis

We're this close to being empty nesters. For this past week we've actually had an advance preview of it with Brandon off at Beach Grad (for you Yankees a tradition of spending a week at the Carolina coast immediatly after high school graduation). So, Friday night, a bottle of fine Pinot Grigio, a romantic movie (OK who new Brideshead Revisited would be quite so "heavy"). All you parents know where I'm going with this. It's like 12:30am. Movie's just ended (although we're kinda looking at each other, scratching our heads and giving each other the "what was that all about" look) wine has been consumed. What happens next? My lovely bride's phone begins to ring. It's our twenty-three year old asking if she can come spend the night. She's just got off work, the highway is closed due to an accident and it would be easier coming to our house then getting home.

Again proving my theory...they never go away and the TRUE reason older folks don't have more children!

No picture to post with this one. I know you'll all thank me for that!!


-- Post From My iPhone 3G

Got the Call

I'm so excited! But then again, right now it wouldn't take much. I got the call today! In amongst the plethora of junk mail. There it was. Semi-official looking. Return address, Jury Clerk, Clerk of Superior Court. Yes...jury duty! Fifty-three years old and never before have I received...the Call. Been registered to vote since I was eighteen. Always kept it current. But never had I been amongst the chosen before. I always assumed it might have to do with my mother's subversive activities in the 60-70s (she was a draft counselor). Couldn't have been mine (OK it WAS me that organized the sit-in protest against hall passes junior year of high school).

Well, I will more than likely have the time on my hands. But wait! (insert screeching brakes and tires here) My lovely bride informs me, not so fast bucko! She seems to think her father, having served as sheriff of this fine county, along with personal relationships we have with sitting judges and active lawyers might just put a nix on my fun. Oh the humanity of it all! From what I've heard, most folks try their best to get out of this civic duty. Such was the case of a young woman I worked with years ago who took a note from the owner of our company stating we couldn't get along without her. That judge made her sit there the whole week without even getting the chance to sit on a jury.

Here I am! Ready to serve! Time on my hands! Proud American wanting to fulfill a lifelong dream.

Pick me! Pick me! Pick me!!

-- Post From My iPhone 3G

Calling in Sick

It's a slightly perplexing situation. Maybe even a bit of insult to injury. But the facts are this...I have a BAD cold. Why is it that this never happened when I had a job to call in sick to? But here I am, three days into my "retirement" and I just plain don't feel well! I'm laying in the bed, my lovely bride is quietly breezing back and forth preparing to go to work when my phone rings. "Dad, so ya wanna talk to me now? I just got your text message from yesterday." Ugh. Timing is everythin, isn't it?! So after a brief conversation with the boy, I hung up. I turned to my lovely bride and asked if she could please walk down the hall and tell my home office "I won't be in today. I have a BAD cold." Now being the ever mindful wife she sauntered off down the hallway to the other end of the house. Upon returning she tells me, "No sweetie, your staff says they need you in today. They say they're lost without you..."

My office staff!

PS

I guess the picture in my previous post becomes a little more humorous (well to me anyway) if I show you all the original picture as I received it from my good friend, David Sullivan, when I shared the lawn tractor story with him via e-mail yesterday.

Just goes to show you how important it is to have good Photoshop skills?!

Getting Backtoit

Has been a long time, hasn't it! Well, since I became "involuntarily" retired this past Monday and I have some free time on my hands I thought, why not!

I can't say it came as a big surprise. Work had dwindled down to a mere trickle. We had started to hunt for "scraps" of material rather than ordering new full sheets. But still. We had survived this far into what has been the worse financial crisis in my lifetime. I have been laid off before in much milder recessions. Maybe, just maybe I was going to squeak through this one.

But, now for the good news! We had sent Margie's fathers lawn tractor out for service a few weeks ago, It had sat in our shed unused since we moved into the old homestead (4 years ago) When they first looked at it they said the whole engine would have to be replaced, it had seized. We had been told by mama that it just needed a belt replaced. Well, surprise, surprise, surprise (think Gomer here) when I got home Monday, there it was. Pistons had just needed a little persuading because it had sat so long.

So...I figure I'm going to sell my car, get my overalls out, get a big straw hat and ride around town on my new lawn tractor! Hardees seems to be the hangout for the AARP crowd to drink coffee and it's not far!

Que the music...

Get your motor runnin'
Head out on the highway
Lookin' for adventure
And whatever comes our way
Yeah Darlin' go make it happen
Take the world in a love embrace
Fire all of your guns at once
And explode into space

I like smoke and lightning
Heavy metal thunder
Racin' with the wind
And the feelin' that I'm under
Yeah Darlin' go make it happen
Take the world in a love embrace
Fire all of your guns at once
And explode into space

Like a true nature's child
We were born, born to be wild
We can climb so high
I never wanna die

Born to be wild
Born to be wild

© MCA Music (BMI)
All rights for the USA controlled and administered by
MCA Corporation of America, INC

--Used with permission--

--Posted from my iPhone 3G