A Twist Of Fate
January, 2010 Entries
"If you don't know where you're going, you might wind up someplace else." - Yogi Berra

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(01/31/10 - 12:02 PM)
Spent the morning listening to the Soup Dragons CD I picked up yesterday, and getting all the new music cataloged into the system.

I got all my chores done, so I'm off to FINALLY try the heavy-horsepower game I got from my friend Tyler for my birthday in October. The old machine couldn't handle it, but I have a suspicion the new one will scoff at it.

We'll see!

(01/30/10 - 11:38 PM)
Got up this morning, went to Madison, got the oil changed and once more raided the cheap bins at the local media exchange store. More and more, it's getting tough to find anything I don't already have that I'm interested in.

I did find a rare Dashboard Confessional CD that I scooped up for a buck. It goes for about $30.00 on-line, so bonus, I guess.

After Madison, we shot down into Rockford, picked up my Mom, and went to visit my brother and sister-in-law in Sycamore for birthday fun (it was just my sister-in-law's birthday.)

We ended up going to a four-star Thai hole-in-the-wall, and the food was certainly something new for me. I ordered the green curry, and it was pretty good, once I added a little lime and hot sauce. I couldn't help but wonder what the eggplant was bringing to the party, though. It seemed unecessary to the dish, on the whole.

Wanda ordered Pad Thai. It's something I've had before (but not nearly as well made as the serving she received) and she was sort of indifferent to it.

At least it was an interesting experience.

My brother's house is coming along nicely. They've eliminated a goodly amount of the wallpaper that plagued the entire place when they moved in, and it's finally taking on a personality more akin to their own.

We also got to see quite a bit of their cat, which - just like I told them - they simply adore.

I just like her little Hitler moustache. It's freakin' hilarious.

We finally got home just before ten, and instead of taking it easy I decided to rip all the CD's to the media library. And the new machine did not disappoint. It averaged just about a minute and a half per disk, which is nothing short of astounding. The whole affair ended up waiting on me, rather than me waiting on the computer, which I wasn't used to.

I'm not complaining though.

(01/29/10 - 5:05 PM)
Got off work fairly late today, so I just ran to the bank, and stopped at the store.

I'm glad that I did, because now I have this story to tell.

I have a tendancy when I shop to make efficient use of space in my cart/basket/other. It's just part of who I am, I suppose.

I call it 'Tetris-ing'. Somehow, that game changed me.

Anyway, The cashier (whom I have had before, but have never spoken with) took one look at my artful pile o' things and commented that she had never seen such a neat stack.

"Yeah," I commented, "I guess all those hours playing Tetris as a kid weren't wasted after all."

What she said next was just... weird.

"Oh!" she said, coming suddenly to life, "I beat my whole family at that game. My whole family, I can beat 'em all!"

Uh... great!, I guess.

"Wow," I said, "Good for you."

Then she made my day.

"They still have it now, only now it's called Bejeweled. I'm really good at that, too."

I knew I should just let it go. My brain actually fought with itself for a moment - it honestly did.

But my mouth won.

"Well, actually, those are two entirely different games," I replied politely.

"No," she retorted, "They're the same thing. One's just got jewels now."

Once more, the sensible part of my brain just said, "let it go."

But my mouth just could not.

"Actually, no. They're two entirely different games, from two entirely different companies with two entirely different concepts and goals."

"No, they're the same." Yet, unsurety crept in now, "If they're not, then what's the difference?"

I patiently explained the concepts of each, as the man behind me politely laughed to himself. I'm not sure who he was laughing at. Either one of us were candidates, albeit for differing reasons.

"Oh!" she now exclaims, "Yes! You're right, you're right."

And that was all.

And all I could think in closing was, "Your family must suck righteously if you can spank them at a game that you don't even understand."

(01/24/10 - 8:16 PM)
Watched the new "It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia" Christmas DVD, and was sadly disappointed. Unlike the fun and wacky episodes I'm used to, this one just felt disjointed and messy.

Plus, the profanity just felt gratuitous. Very rarely am I a fan of profanity. Sometimes - just sometimes - it really helps to hammer a point or thought home; set a mood. In this case, however, it just felt like one of the writers spoke up during the script creation and said, "Hey! This is going straight to DVD! Let's throw the f-word in five or six times! What'tya say guys!"

I hope if they try a longer episode again, they'll learn from the experience of this one. Or, perhaps more likely, this show just cannot function in a slot more than 22 minutes long. And who's to say that that's a bad thing?

(01/23/10 - 4:42 PM)
Spent the morning making the network play nice again (the new machine decided that the old one didn't exist anymore sometime during the night).

I also tried to blog with the new keyboard. The problem is that my old one has a high-profile set of keys, and a horizontal center set. The new one is EXTREMELY low profile, has a more constricted spacing, and has a VERTICAL center set.

What the hell, man?

I finally got pissed off enough to hot-swap the keyboard and mouse between the two machines, and I am now blissfully typing away on a keyboard that has typed millions of characters for me in the past years.

I missed you guys.

This, plus dimming the brightness and trying to get the SoundBlaster card to recognize my 7.1 speaker set, has taken up the majority of my morning, hence the lateness in posting.

Plus, I had to configure FileZilla for this machine.

All in all, I'm going to put this new machine through some more paces today, and see what she can do. I know I don't have anything here that will even tax it's quad-core and 8GB of RAM. But I can try, right?

(01/23/10 - 4:42 PM)
Spent the day learning about all the stuff I didn't know about the new version of Windows, while downloading and installing copious amounts of software and updates.

I like the new computer. I think I'll like it more when I can run some of the stuff I need to run on it without crashing it.

Oh, yeah - it took me less than an hour to hard-crash the little guy. I was actually a little surprised.

The new version of Windows has some things I like, and some things that I don't. Why they changed so many interface-related items is beyond me. And while the learning curve shouldn't be too steep, I can't help but feeling that it's simply UNECESSARY.

There's alot of gee-gaws, bells and whistles in here which could go either way, I suppose. For me, they're not a necessity. For the casual user, they're probably fun.

I do like the ability of the OS to do things that in the past have been an impossibility. It seems to 'self-heal' under the right circumstances, which is good. The bad part is that in circumstances where it should, it seems to get confused.

Oh, and I HATE the new keyboard and mouse. Who's idea were these?

At any rate, I know the machine will last me a while so I had better get comfortable with it.

(01/22/10 - 7:42 PM)
Woo-hoo! Overtime this week!

Seriously, it was hard-won, but I really miss it. Not just for the monetary gain, but I perform better when I'm not pressed for time.

I left work a little early, and bought a month's worth of groceries. We were out of just about EVERYTHING, and if we didn't want to have Capers & Honey Surprise for dinner, someone needed to go.

I got a call from my Assistant just as I was leaving the store.

"Your new computer is here."

I was a bit surprised, as it wasn't supposed to be in until after February 5th.

So, I ran back by the shop and picked it up.

As I was leaving, our former houseguest pulled up alongside me to say hello. She works across the street from me, so she could see me tooling around the lot.

She's doing well, and she seems so happy that she's been able to make it on her own this long. To those of you who said I probably shouldn't bother helping her because 'People like that always go back into the abusive situations', I heartily flip you a double bird. Have a little faith next time: In humanity, and in myself and my wife.

I got the new computer home, and decided I wasn't going to go to the trouble of setting the thing up tonight. Then I changed my mind, not because I was excited (believe it or not) but because I hate looming projects.

Within an hour and a half I had my office all reorganized, with two machines running side by side, and I was tired and dusty.

So, we'll see how long it takes me to master Windows 7.

(01/20/10 - 11:58 PM)
I got home from the auction at about 11:30 this evening. Specifically, the auction was over at about 7:30, but by the time we loaded up, I took my compatriot home, and I got back to the shop it was 8:30. When I saw how much work had piled up during the day, I elected to order-in dinner and stay.

It's been a while since I worked a 17-hour day, and I actually enjoyed it.

We picked up everything we needed at the auction (yay!) and these machines will enable us to start up our grinding department nicely. We picked up an OD, ID and flat grinder for next to a song, so it was a good day all around.

I was also well prepared, so I knew what the stuff I wanted sold for new, and what I was willing to give for it. What amazed me was how many people apparently didn't have this information, as they bid items up to (and in a few cases, over) new pricing. Which was sad all around for both them, and the people who were looking to get a deal.

My compatriot was a long-time grinder. He's 61, and is semi-retired. But he's interested (nee, passionate) about his art, and when he heard we were starting a grinding endeavor, he was excited. Which was fine by us, because we needed the assistance and sage advice. And it came in spades.

Not only did he point out good and bad points about the machines to be auctioned, he also worked the crowd while I remained in the auction area. The result was that he would come back every so often with intelligence on certain machines. He would find former employees, and ask questions about the machines, etc. He learned that one machine we weren't sure we wanted to bid on had recently been rebuilt, had a $3,000.00 MARPAS unit on it, as well as an expensive Arnold gage. None of these things were evident, so we went after that machine. The beauty was, no one else seemed to want it.

We also learned that one machine that was on our agenda (the sister machine to the one above) had some unseen problems. Further, it was only made for a short period of time. As such, the main boards for the controller were no longer available - and this one was 12 years old. Suffice it to say that once the controller board went, one would have to replace the entire controller.

Dude, this guy was so keen. And did I mention his story about playing bumper pool with Tommy Smothers? Good story.

As the auction wound down, I learned on my feet that observing the crowd and the auctioneer yields better pricing. And that patience is a virtue well rewarded.

I almost think I was a natural, for whatever reason. It was something like a game, and even though the stakes were high, I found myself not feeling at all uncomfortable playing.

On the whole, a loooong day, but a good one.

Now we just need to get them rigged in...

(01/19/10 - 7:14 PM)
Ladies and Gentlemen:

It is my esteemed priviledge to bring you the following tale of insanity. What you are about to read really happened. Not only did it happen, it happened without embellishment. Seriously, it just doesn't get any better than today.

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I once again introduce for your reading enjoyment - Mr. Phillips Screwdriver.

Nine-twenty AM: I am in my office. I am working. Behind me, I hear a small noise of paper being mildly disturbed, followed by a throat clearning that God himself would hold in the utmost esteem.

And like a deer in my headlights, there he was. Unlike a deer in my headlights, I didn't have the option to hit him.

"What's up?", I asked, not even remotely wanting to know.

In his hands, he held a blueprint. A blueprint that I had lovingly annotated prior to sending it to the floor so that a situation such as this could not arise. Apparently, I had lacked clarity.

"This here," he began, "Am I doing this [points to features with notes and arrows SPECIFICALLY saying that], and this is getting EDM'd [points to other features with more notes and arrows SPECIFICALLY saying that too]? Is that what this means?"

A step back: EDM stands for 'electro-static discharge' machining. Think of it as using shaped lightning to obliterate steel in those hard-to-machine situations. This particular component required the operator to mill two areas on the top-portion of the part. The remainder would then be obliterated via EDM, as it was nearly impossible to achieve the feature via conventional methods.

And EDM costs money. Like any other service in this world, ain't nothing free. (I'm using ain't ironically, by the way.)

"Yes," came my congenial reply. "We are doing the top portion, and the remainder will be EDM'd."

There. Question answered. Right?

Not - even - close.

"Well, then why don't we just let them do the whole thing?"

I fought back the urge to punch him in the testicles. Instead, I said what he already knew, "EDM costs money. I'm only having them do the portion that we cannot, so that we retain as much profit as possible on this component."

Elegant in it's simplicity, really. I was not prepared for what I heard next.

"Well, that's just stupid. They might as well just do it all, then."

I mentally took off one glove. If he was itching for an arguement, I was going to be annoying as hell. "Them I'm stupid, [Mr. Phillips Screwdriver]. Nevertheless, it's a decision I have considered and have made. Every .001" of material they remove costs 'X' dollars. This is the most economical way to make this part. Do you have any other questions?"

I was definately not prepared this time either.

"Oh! That reminds me," came his reply. "My wife wants to sell cookies."

At this point, he gazed at me like an owl on Valium.

When it appeared I was supposed to respond, as in his eyes I had been given more than enough information to do so, I responded, "I don't understand. Sell cookies?"

"Uh. Yeah. She wants to sell cookies. She'll - you know - batch 'em all up in tins and such... a dozen in each. And sell 'em."

Now, the average person could infer a whole host of things from this conversation at this specific juncture. I, having been painstakingly trained in Mr. Phillips Screwdriver's behavioral quirks, realized what he was now saying.

"She wants you to sell them here? At work?"

"Yeah. There a problem with that?", he asked with an honest-to-God aire of annoyance.

"Well," I measured out my response carefully so as to deflect, "You'd have to ask Dave about that."

Dave is my Boss, who is currently in Costa Rica, and has been for the past eight days.

"Well, alright. When's he comin' back?"

"Thursday evening. He should be in Friday for sure."

At this point, I noticed something. Something I would not normally look twice at, but in the context of cookies coming from his home and into our shop for our employees to 'buy', I felt it worth noting.

Specifically, I looked at his shirt. Now, no one where I work is even close to being considered a fashion plate. We all wear whatever works, because more than likely it's lifespan will be short and dirty in the environment we work in. What struck me about his shirt, was that it was COATED (and I mean COATED with a capital 'Ewwww') in some sort of animal fur(s), fuzz, and some other things I could not identify but looked wholly unsanitary.

All I could think was, "If this stuff is that engrained into your home environment (and clearly, it is) then how much of that will be cookie-borne into potential >cough< 'customers' stomachs?"

I actually shuddered a little.

This, apparently, was the end of our conversation, as Mr. Phillips Screwdriver simply turned away and left at a totally awkward moment.

Oooookay - whatever.

But it doesn't end there! Dear readers, hold onto your keyboards - for today you're getting a two-fer!

I proceeded to wrap up what I was working on, and in less than five minutes I was in the inspection area working on another facet of my job. I noted that the coffee in the decanter was dangerously close to being non-existant, so I decided to be a nice guy and make some for the troops (I don't drink the stuff, personally.)

So, I got a pot going. Half-way through the brew cycle, Mr. Phillips Screwdriver ambles from Lord-knows-where over to the coffee maker. Without so much as glancing, he removes the carafe from its rightful place. The moment he does, coffee continues to expel from the machine directly onto the warming plate.

As the hissing becomes more incessant, Mr. Phillips Screwdriver looks down, only now seeing the mess he's making. After a brief look at me (maybe for moral support? Who the hell knows) he puts his cup beneath the outflow until it is full. Then he replaces the carafe, turns to me and says, "No see."

WOW.

So, now there's a puddle of java all over the coffeemaker, and the counter area. After waiting a few beats to see if he's actually going to get after it before it hits the floor and points beyond, I see him look directly at the paper towel I keep on my counter to wipe oil from my hands.

Then he turns away. As he does, I now realize that I had better take care of this. I move DIRECTLY NEXT TO THE COFFEE MAKER where a roll of highly-absorbent BLUE shop towels hang literally three inches from the coffee maker, where they have been hung since 1998. I begin taking a few off, when he suddenly turns around and mumbles, "Oh. There's some there."

At which point he watches me clean up, and says, "No see." once more just before lumbering off into the sunset.

I love my job.

(01/17/10 - 9:32 AM)
And now for a special Sunday installment of 'Heath Tries To Be Funny By Making Up Jokes Best Left Un-Made-Up!'


Here's a list of the top five video games preferred by gay teen boys everywhere:

  • Pac-Man
  • Dig-Dug
  • Moon Patrol
  • Double Dragon
  • JumpMan

(01/16/10 - 6:11 PM)
Spent the morning at a co-workers' home attempting to fix his non-virus protected computer. I got the thing up and running, got a virus scanner installed and configured. I even got it updated. I also finagled some other things to clean up a bit before the re-boot. I re-booted and attempted to login to Windows XP. The login took as it should have, but after about thirty seconds booted me back out while letting me know that it was saving my settings.

Numerous attempts thereafter resulted in the same thing.

So, I re-configured the BIOS to allow for a direct boot from the CD-ROM drive. This way, it could boot right from the Norton System Security disc, and fix whatever was wrong.

I booted, downloaded the updates, configured, and waited. And waited. And waited. For forty-five minutes.

I re-booted and did the same thing, but with a slightly different configuration. Still no-go.

I finally gave up when I came to the realization that something (most likely one of the viruses/worms/trojans that had brought me here in the first place) was disallowing what should have been a simple task.

I ended up taking the machine to my friend Gary. He's got PC's laying around that he can slave the drive to and clean it up that way. I could have done this, but as a one computer-guy, it's more than a bit of a hassle.

When I got to Gary's house, he mentioned that he was a aware of (but had yet to see) a virus that did precisely what mine was doing.

Super! I'm soooooo lucky!

So, instead of taking an hour to give my co-worker's computer a check-up and massive colonic, I ended up spending four hours while achieving essentially nothing.

In hindsight, it would have been nice to know about a virus such as this one. Live and learn, I suppose.

(01/15/10 - 5:46 PM)
If Friday had come any later, I don't think that I'd have made it.

I was supposed to leave early today. Instead, everyone else did so, without recalling that we had a shipment of brass coming late in the afternoon, and that the copier guy was still coming our way via Waukegan.

Whoops.

So, I got to stay to finish out what had already been a most trying day. The upside was that I now don't have to go in tomorrow.

I also ordered a new computer today. I've been putting it off for quite some time now. It's not that my old computer isn't functional - it is. The problem is that for the last year, I have been running it beyond what it was intended to run at one time. As such, I've gone to the trouble of bumping up the RAM as much as possible, cleaning house in both the registry and the TSR's, and adding-on a cache memory manager. All of these things have helped, but the end result is still just a lesser version of the same.

I'm running so many applications in one sitting (i.e. - multitasking) that it's just too much for the poor little guy. The hard drive inevitably takes a beating as the RAM gets full, and this slows the thing down further. Couple this with the fact that I just tied-in a wireless home network with this machine as the hub, and that was the straw that broke the camel's back.

So, I ordered a new one. Hopefully, this new one will take the brunt of the network applications, do what I need it to do, and not even break a sweat. We shall see.

(01/14/10 - 7:32 PM)
It's Thursday. Here's a meager one that I came up with the other day:


What did the mother say to her teenage daughter when she told her she was a lesbian?

"Honey, you've got to start thinking outside of the box."

(01/13/10 - 7:26 PM)


4 8 15 16 23 42




(01/12/10 - 5:13 PM)
My Expediting Manager called me at home to ask a question about a project that a customer had brought in just before he had gone home for the day. I helped him with his inquiry, and the conversation was just about to wrap up when he said:

"Oh, hey! The front door lock needs to be replaced."

I asked why, and he said that he could not turn it from the inside. My next question was whether his key worked from the outside, regardless of what was happening within.

"Yeah, it did actually. Why?"

I explained to him that, for reasons unknown, this periodically happens during cold weather. I further let him know that it had happened to me just the other day, but by the next morning all was right with the tempermental mechanism once more.

"Well," came his relpy, "It still needs to be fixed."

I began to re-explain my point when he cut me off:

"I took a torch to it, but that didn't work. So I grabbed a wrench. It eventually gave and came loose, but I definately heard something go inside. It definately needs to be fixed."

So - in a nutshell - he was telling me that when he found a problem that required nothing more than patience, he used a wrench and fire to make it worse.

Redneck: 1 | Door: 0

Does this make sense to anyone? Seriously: how often does the 'brute-force' method work to solve anything mechanical, especially something as delicate as a high-end door lock?

To say I was angry and disappointed was an understatement.

(01/11/10 - 4:28 PM)
I asked my assistant how her weekend was, and she replied that it was hectic and busy. She then went on to explain that she had spent most of the weekend at our office, printing and assembling home-made invitations for 'the baby shower'.

It took a moment for what she had just said to set in, so I asked the obvious question.

"Nooooo!," she said, "For my friend, not me. I'm in charge of the shower."

And then, a split-second later, she added, "My printer has been out of ink for a looooooong time."

I sat pondering the significance of the metaphor she had just laid on me. After about twelve seconds, I realized that she wasn't presenting a metaphor about her ability and/or desire to conceive. Rather she was explaining WHY she had come to the office to use our printers.

I explained to her why I had gone silent, and I thought she would die laughing.

Sometimes, my sense of humor insists upon itself, even when it ought not to.

(01/10/10 - 11:02 AM)
It's snowed in the midwest once more. Quite a bit, actually. It was a progressive sort of snow. The sort of snow that forces one to shovel their driveway with alarming regularity.

Shoveling, because I was told that my snowblower - scarcely five years old, and with less than 20 hours on it - was toast. I was told that while I bought a reputable brand, that particular model was someone else's product, with the superior name on it.

Super!

So, I'll be shoveling the remainder of the winter.

What really pisses me off, is that it was an expensive snowblower. One that had never quite worked right, and one whose tires I had just had tubed so they wouldn't go flat after 20 minutes of use.

The lesson? Buy a Toro. I have learned from some very reputable sources that anything else is just a fools' errand.

Anyway... back to the snow. It snowed a ton, and then proceeded to freeze colder than a nun's libido. So we now have a massive blanket of frozen snow all over God's creation.

Dear Spring: Please come soon.

(01/09/10 - 5:12 PM)
Spent the day with the Media Library (I know - shocker, there) filling holes, mostly. Amazon.com has a deal where if you buy a regular album, you get a discounted one for free. What this means to me, is that I can fill my holes on two fronts (insert your own joke there - I'll wait.) I can get ahold of some of those niggling missing items, while picking up some good end of the year deals that I would have picked up anyway.

You see, at the end of each year, they discount a number of albums that were popular in either that year, or a year past (predominantly.) This year, they went from a mere fifty, to eight-hundred and forty-six, while including all genres, categories, and release dates. This means that I can get that well-received alternative rock album for cheap, while also buying something I needed anyway. When you amortize the pricing over the two albums, it's a pretty good deal.

So, that was essentially my Saturday. Oh, and I read some. I'm warming up to reading again, so expect more book reviews soon.

(01/08/10 - 4:16 PM)
I learned today that while my Boss is in Costa Rica, I will be attending an auction in his stead. This will be the first time I've gone to a machinery auction solo, and I'm a little nearvous.

It's not that I'm afraid to spend money - I'm not. There have been days when I'll spend 17K in less than eight minutes. And I've had jobs where I've cut $25,000.00 checks that were my responsibility. So that's not really it.

I think most of all, I'm hoping to do precisely what he would do while in his stead. And sometimes, he's a wildcard. So, we'll see how it goes.

We're looking to add some grinding capabilities to our shop. We've been re-configuring 1/4 of our building to accept the new equipment, and our bank has green-lighted us for more than enough capital to finance the endeavor so all in all it should come off fine. That is, IF we can purchase the equipment we require at the right price. It turns out that the auction I am being sent to is local, and small. Our hope is that these two factors, coupled with the current state of the economy, will keep the number of potential serious bidders to a minimum. If this is the case, we can outfit our entire operation with the now defunct companies' equipment and be up and running in a matter of weeks. They have PRECISELY what we require (along with alot of other 'fluff' machines that I hope everyone is more interested in than the ones we want) and to have all that in one place, auction-wise, is something of a rarity.

I'll also have the assistance of a long-time friend of the company who is nearing retirement, and has been a grinder for forty-five years. This should be a huge asset to me, as it levels the playing field between myself, and others who are looking to purchase equipment for their own grinding operations that they understand implicitly.

Add to this the fact that I have an old acquaintance who is out of a job (and shouldn't be) who is a seasoned and skilled OD, ID and surface grinder (something of a rarity) who we would like to hire, and I have all the more impetus to succeed.

Cross your fingers, kids.

(01/06/10 - 7:18 PM)
Spent the afternoon removing duplicate entries from the music playlist that I post on my page. For those of you who have looked in the past, you might have noted 2, even 3 of the same song listed. This is due to several factors, but the end result is something that's bugged me for a long time. So, I removed about 99% of them. There are still some, even as of this writing, but I don't have the drive to re-check the list. Suffice it to say though that I removed a couple THOUSAND. This should make the list more user-friendly for those of you trying to find out who sang that obscure song you like so much.

Plus, it caters to my OCD side nicely.

(01/05/10 - 6:41 PM)
My boss brought squirrel in for his lunch today (don't ask.) Having never had it, when he offered me some I couldn't very well say no. I'm the type of person who'll try just about anything once.

People have often described it as greasy. Yep, I agree.

It tasted vaguely like dark meat from a turkey leg. Something I'm not terribly fond of.

So I've tried it. Now I'll never have to again.

(01/03/10 - 8:02 PM)
Welcome to 'Heath Tries To Be Funny: Sports Edition!'


A color commentator and a play-action commentator sat in their booth during the tail-end of the seventh inning stretch at a baseball game. As the players began taking the field, a woman ran out of the stands toward the first baseman. She reached him, and proceeded to hit him in the testicles three times, at which point the man passed out.

The whole stadium went silent.

Then, the color commentator said loudly into his microphone, "Well folks, that's two balls, three strikes, and he's out!"

The play-action commentator looked at his co-worker in amazement.

"What!", the color commentator said. "I figured if you weren't going to call it, then someone had to!"

(01/02/10 - 4:26 PM)
My Great-Uncle's funeral was today. He was 88. Here was a guy who seemed to have suffered through the worst of things - surgery, pneumonia, etc. - and was on the road to recovery. Then his body just gave up.

I'm glad that he had such a long life, and I'm happy that I was able to see him one final time so recently. Yet I still reflect on the fact that I really didn't know him. I once more wonder how many amazing stories and life-experiences are lost when someone dies without having passed them on. I almost think it should be mandatory for individuals to blog. Can you imagine being able to cherry-pick through the entries to find the gems of a life well-spent, so that future generations will be able to remember who you truly were, without having to have been alive and cognizent before your passing?

Older folks, I implore you: write down your experiences. Especially the ones that mean the most to you. Perhaps someone such as myself could even put together an HTML 'family tree' of posts, for future generations. Imagine being gone, but amongst your family in digital form to never be truly forgotten. It would be like a living archive of family and friends, for anyone to access.

Holy cats, I think I'm onto something here. Any takers?

(01/01/10 - 12:06 AM)
Happy New Year to all but the Chinese (yours comes later - or earlier, depending on how you see it.)

Spent the evening with my wife, some good champagne and some good DVD's.

Being simple is awesome.


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