Just Another Rainy Sunday

I guess today was a more or less normal Sunday around the Brockmann casa.

It began for me around 6:30 when I woke with a start realizing it was not dark outside. That's 2 days in a row that I slept through the night! After last week and the "Vampire Project" from work, it's a fact worth noting.

Once I had consumed a couple of cups of coffee, I made my Sunday morning pilgrimage to Wal-Mart. It's a good excuse to get out and see what's changed in Monroe. Verdict, not a lot.

I brought back the obligatory Sunday newspaper for Marilyn, some food for Wally, an assortment of toiletries for the trip, and a new suitcase. My old one had vanished into the ether.

Once I sorted out the loot, I sat down in my recliner, and turned on the TV. I spent the next couple of hours flipping back and forth between Spike and Speed.

As soon as it got hot enough, I hooked the truck to the trailer, pulled it forward about 20 feet, and mowed under the trailer. After I put it back where it belonged, I did the giant slalom around all of the treasures in the back yard, and mowed the front and side yards. Then I pulled, prodded, and cursed the weed-eater until it decided to cooperate. Start to finish, the yard took about 2 hours.

After a brief cool-down, I went upstairs to see how Marilyn was getting along with the newspaper, and discovered that Gizmo, our cat, was on top of a 7' tall hutch in the corner of the living room. Sometimes I think that cat can fly. It was a good 3 1/2 feet from the back of the couch to the top of the hutch. Beam me up, Scotty.

Once we finished laughing, Sandy came over, and she and Marilyn went to Macy's in Athens. They met Jon, Missy, and Violet, and spent several hours shopping.

Being left to my own devices, I grabbed a hand full of tools, and put a grille insert into the Jeep. I've grown tired of the trash that accumulates between the grille and the radiator. The screen should go a long way toward eliminating the mess. Since nothing is ever as easy as it seems to be, the whole deal (bolting a screen behind the grille opening with 4 bolts) took over 3 hours. I think the brace on the back of the grille shell is the first piece they grab when they build a Jeep. I had to take the air box out, disconnect the radiator braces, take out 6 bolts that held the radiator in, take out 12 more that bolted the fenders to the grille shell, disconnect the front body mount, and finally remove the brace. Then I slipped the screen behind the grille, bolted it in, and spent 45 minutes putting everything back where I found it. It looks good, and everything still works.

All things considered, it was fun.

Just about the time I was finishing up, the sky started to get dark. 10 minutes and .5 inch of rain later, the power went out. It's tough to blog in the dark. 90 minutes later, Walton EMC had replaced the whacked transformer or broken line that blacked out our neighborhood. That's the longest power outage in recent memory. The EMC does a great job of keeping my toys energized.

When the power came back on, Marilyn pounced on the computer and continued her "Knob Quest". Good news on the kitchen front, too. The cabinets shipped Friday, and should be here next week. Perfect timing. I leave in 8 days. :-)

I hope you all have a great week.

Saturday...And I Don't Have to WORK!!

This has been an unusual Saturday. I actually got to do what I really wanted to do today, vs. what I really had to do.

This morning was atypical as I didn't get up until after 6:00 AM. Usually, I'm up before 5. Then, I had little to nothing to do until around 9:00 when the garage was due to be overrun by appliance boxes. So, it was a mad rush to get all of the stuff that would be needed out of the storage that would be blocked by a range, dishwasher, microwave/range hood, kitchen sink, and refrigerator. All of the trip goodies that were in the steel shelves are now in the Jeep.

Mission accomplished.

The appliances are beautiful. I'm sure they are, since Marilyn selected them, but, right now beauty is brown cardboard boxes. The garage is full of future condos for urban outdoorsmen.

As the appliances were being unloaded and moved into the purgatory of my shop/garage, Gretchen came home. It's always good to see her. She's been through a lot, and has become one of my favorite people again. Even when she's down she brightens my day.

This afternoon, I decided to take care of a chore I'd been postponing for weeks. I rotated the tires on the Jeep. These things are fairly large, 33x12.5x16, and weigh about 70 pounds each. Schlepping them around is a job for the young. Fortunately, only my body is old. As usual, nothing is ever as simple as it starts out. I got the left front wheel up on the jack stand, and the floor jack would not release. I got a pipe wrench, broke the rusted shaft loose, and got the jack lowered, and the left front wheel suspended 2 inches in the air. Perfect.

The next unplanned chore was to fix the jack so I could do the other 3 wheels. 15 minutes with a 9/16 wrench, a can of WD-40 (a.k.a. Miracle in a Can), a pass with a wire wheel to de-rust the end of the handle, and a glob of grease later, the jack was as good as new. The other 3 wheels went up on the stands without a hitch. 20 minutes later, the wheels were in their new homes. Another successful assault on the to-do list.

During the tire rotation, I got to speak on the phone with Jon and Bobby. Jon needed advice on replacing a door that had an altercation with a mower-launched rock, and Bobby needed to talk and relate the good time he had camping through a tornado on Skid-a-Way Island. I needed to hear both their voices. Both were welcome breaks. It was warm out in the driveway.

While I'm gone, Bobby is planning a family camping trip with his siblings and buddies from the Legion of Doom (more on the LOD in a future post). I got to thinking about Sandy, Slade, Tyler, and Sam, and their complete lack of camping equipment. I gave them a call and volunteered some or all of my gear.

While I was talking to Slade he mentioned his latest acquisition. A Gold, 1977 Cadillac Coupe de Ville that he got in a swap for a 6-wheel ATV. So I grabbed a camera, jumped in the Jeep and roared off toward their house.

The car is amazing. It is BIG! You can land aircraft on the hood. It is also in the best condition of any 31 year old car I've seen in a long time. The body is straight, everything from the A/C to the 8-track player works. (Full disclosure: Almost everything works. The wiper switch is bad.)

After a really nice visit with Sandy and Slade, and a quick ride in the land yacht, I headed home and waited for Marilyn's call as she left work. This is a much appreciated ritual, and I think it's a "I need to talk to somebody who's not griping" moment for Marilyn. I don't think I could do 12 hours in an emergency room. She's currently on the other computer continuing her "Knob Quest" for the kitchen trim. It's good to have her here.

I'm blessed by being surrounded with good people. It will be tough being away from them for the best part of 3 weeks.

9 days and counting.

One Man's Small Triumphs

Yesterday was a pretty good day on several fronts.

I managed to make enough room to fit all of Marilyn's new kitchen into the garage without throwing away any power tools. The appliances and cabinets will be delivered (and must be stored here somewhere) before the installers show up, and the only place out of the rain is the garage. It's only a single car, attached garage, and contains 40 years worth of accumulated shop equipment. If you need to pull an engine, work some wood, repair nearly anything, or build your dream project, I can help.

I beat down the insurance company (again) on the last of the prescriptions I will need for my trip. I've gone into this before. The pharmacy said no, and after a little persuasion, the insurance company said, "OK No problem." Then I 'splained it to the pharmacy, and they did what they should have done in the first place. It only took two trips to CVS. Lately, that's a major victory.

Marilyn winnowed the cabinet hardware selection down to where she was willing to ask if I could live with her choice. I can live with anything she chooses. I trust her good taste, and it's her project. I would not attempt to tell DaVinci how to paint, and I certainly won't get in the way of Marilyn's dream kitchen. She deserves it. I'm only regretful of not being able to give her more room in which to put it.

And I finally put the "Vampire Project" at work into its grave. I was up until 0-dark-thirty again, but the undead database purge has a stake driven through its heart. It will be good to see sunlight again, and see if I still have a desk at the office. I'm still a little short on sleep, and probably won't make it entirely through the day, but I've got this one behind me.

By the way, only 10 days remain until the trip.

Stay well.

T Minus 11

Eleven days until the liftoff of the Cosmic Muffin (sorry, Bob and Jimmy, but I had to steal your line).

Preparations are progressing slowly, due primarily to an over abundance of WORK :(.

Late last week, we had a virus problem at work that propagated to our sales agencies. I got an alert that one of the servers was low on space. Since the whole office was in panic mode over the virus, I verified that this agency was not infected. Then I started digging around in their database, looking for the cause of the space problem. I discovered that they had a lot of old crud in there, and, like the idiot I am, I volunteered to clean it up for them. Normally this is a 2 night deal. I've been up hammering on this beast for the last 3 nights, and with luck, will finish it up on Friday. They had a LOT of old crud.

I've been up so much in the middle of the night that I'm beginning to feel like sunlight will cause me to burst into flame. I look around in fear for guys in capes with wooden stakes.

There is an upside to this whole thing. I think I've spent a total of 10 hours in the office this week. Working from home has its advantages.

But back to the preparations.

Things are actually progressing quite well. I've outfitted the driver's seat of the Jeep with a gel seat cushion. Since I got the long face from Dr. McBee about my blood sugar, I've lost about 40 pounds, and most of the natural seat cushion I used to haul around. This should go a long way toward making the ride more enjoyable.

This weekend, I plan to rotate the (extremely heavy) tires, violate all kinds of stupid laws by washing the thing, clean the interior well, and then get the garage in shape to use as a storage area for appliances and cabinets for the new kitchen. The appliances are due to arrive on Saturday, and Marilyn wants the new fridge in place then.

I'll probably also spend some time in the laundry and over the ironing board (gasp!) getting my wardrobe ready for the big event.

Now that I've completely depressed myself, I think I'll quit.

See y'all tomorrow.

The Count-Down Begins

In only 12 days, I'll be on the road, starting my Lap of America. I'll hit the road the morning of July 7 and head for Michigan to visit with my Mom and sister. After a couple of days in Saline, I'll point the Jeep toward Chicago. Once I clear the bottom of the Great Lakes, I plan to visit Mt. Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Memorial, the Black Hills, and anything else that looks interesting on my way to Ennis, MT. There I'll meet with my buddy Teddy, his cousin, and another guy from work, and we'll spend a week in southwest Montana chasing trout. The third week of my trip will involve a stop off in Seward, Nebraska where my oldest son was born, and a visit with my Mother-in-Law in Concordia, Missouri. Then it's on toward Monroe.

I don't think I'll be bored.

In the intervening time, I have a few things to put together and get loaded into the Jeep. 4 fishing rods of various descriptions, a bag with my waders and fishing equipment, clothes, laptop, 3 different cameras, Ipod, phone, drugs, GPS, binoculars, tool kits, first aid kit, about 83 different battery chargers, 25 miles of computer cables to connect everything to the laptop, and a partridge in a pear tree.

One thing I've never been accused of, is having insufficient equipment. When we camp, I drag a 5x8 enclosed trailer behind the Jeep with at least half a ton of "necessary" equipment. We're prepared to cut fire wood, catch our dinner, cook it, sleep in comfort, deal with inclement weather, and entertain ourselves.

This trip, I'll be traveling a little lighter. I won't have to tote my lodging, heat, or food with me. About the only thing necessary this trip will be me and a couple of credit cards. If I need it and don't have it, I'll buy it. In the words of Mel Brooks, "It's good to be the king!" :-)

Rest assured, I'll have the 'puter with me to process and post pictures, descriptions of what I see, visit, and otherwise encounter.

I'm really looking forward to this trip. I've wanted to fish the Blue Ribbon streams in the west for 20 years.

But there are a number of things I'll miss.

First, and foremost, I'll be away from Marilyn and our family. After 39 years, I've learned that traveling by myself is much less enjoyable than traveling with my family. They're all good people. (Most of them take after their Mom.)

I'll miss Wally-the-wonder-dog. I hope I'll be able to sleep without him pre-warming my side of the bed.

I'll also miss the kitchen construction. Marilyn's scheduled to have the kitchen rebuilt while I'm gone. I know I won't miss the 1973 Harvest Gold range and counter tops. :-) I'm thrilled for her. She's spent the last hour and a half on the other computer plotting something to do with cabinet hardware. I've not seen her happier in a long time. I guess it's good to be the Queen, too.

One thing I hope I don't think about is work. I'll have my RSA token with me, and unless I get a new cell phone before the trip, the guys at Acuity Brands Lighting will be able to track me down. If I need to, I can connect to my desktop at work from hotels and truck stops. Technology stinks.

Enough. I'll try to be a little more entertaining tomorrow.

Monday, Monday.

What can I say? Mondays are a good place to start the week. In most cases, things can only improve.

Consider my Monday for a moment.

I started out as normal with a cup of coffee and a check of my email. Once I got myself put together and suitable for public viewing, I started loading up for the trek to work. My pockets got my cell phone, epi-pen (in case I'm attacked by a wasp), pocket knife (if I'm wearing pants, I'm carrying a knife...an old Boy Scout habit), keys and mechanical pencil. My belt got my security badge. My laptop case was loaded with the laptop, day planner (I still like to write things on paper), RSA token (so I can connect to work from where ever I roam :-( ), spare glasses (special set for reading computer screens), and an apple (the vegatable kind).

I then schlepped all of this crud out to the Jeep, came back into the house, kissed Marilyn goodbye, told Wally to protect the house, and left for Conyers.

The Jeep and I had our usual argument at the end of the street. It wanted to turn right and go play in the mountains. I knew I should turn left and go to work. I won. We both lost.

When I got to work, things started to look up. I was able to knock out about 90% of what I needed to do in the first couple of hours. I left around 1:30 because I had 7+ hours of maintenance to do tonight on one of our sales agency servers.

Pleasant surprise #1: When I got home, there was a black Trailblazer parked in the driveway. Missy and Violet were visiting. They're a couple of my favorite people. Violet is standing at every chance, crawls fast enough to harass the cat, and has learned to sit gracefully. A couple of weeks ago her technique was to let go and let gravity do the work. Missy is always a ray of sunshine.

Missy, Mom, and Violet decided to go adventuring around Monroe, so I took the afternoon and did nothing with it. Perfect. :-)

Around 7:00 PM, the phone rang with a problem from work. One of the drawbacks to remembering stuff that nobody else wants to know is that you get to be on call all the time. I guess this one falls into the "I'd rather be abused than ignored" category.

Pleasant surprise #2: I tried to connect to the agency server, and they're offline. I guess I can do this again tomorrow.

OK, I've bored you enough for one day. I promise to do better tomorrow.

Wally

Just in case you don't know about Wally, he's our guard dog. He's about 8 years old and showed up on Father's day in 2000. He's Marilyn's person. About all he needs me for is to let him back into the house after he's visited the back yard.

Wally reminds me of Oscar the Grouch. He's shaggy, unkempt, and has the disposition of a pit viper with people he does not know. When the idiot from the cabinet company showed up early and banging on the front door, Wally took issue with him opening the storm door to let himself in. Let's just leave it at saying the cabinet guy learned some humility that day. One thing in Wally's favor is that he's a great judge of character. The cabinet guy is/was a jerk.

For all his ferociousness, he's got the common flaw of most bullies. He's afraid of something silly. In his case it's thunder and lightning, which brings me to the other thing he needs me for. He hides under my feet when the clouds get vocal. If he could crawl into my pocket, I think he would. If the storm hits in the middle of the night, he'll retreat from his guard post at the foot of the bed and hide his head between the pillows.

Since I mentioned his guard post, I ought to tell you about how it varies with the relative positions of Marilyn and myself. He always puts himself between the front door and one or both of us. If Marilyn's in the living room and I'm downstairs, he's positioned in the front hall. At night he's always between us and the door.

Still, he's good people, loyal, tolerant of Violet and short people in general, loves Marilyn (I told you he was a good judge of character), and would take on a polar bear if he thought any of his folks were threatened.

I hope he's with us for a long time.

I'm Surrounded by Idiots!

I've mentioned that I'm going to be visiting Montana next month to separate some blue ribbon trout from their homes. Well, the preparations are under way, and not going all that smoothly.

I take enough medications to rattle like a gourd when I come down the stairs in the morning, and a couple of them (for my blood pressure) were due to be renewed today. I went in to the nice lady at the local CVS and explained that I would need a 60 day supply to hold me over through my vacation. She said, "No problem."

She lied.

When I went to pick the meds up this evening, there was a sticky note attached that said the insurance company would not let me have more than 30 days at a time. This did not help my blood pressure. I paid, and went home, grabbed the phone and through a red fog called the insurance folks.

After 5 minutes in "Auto Answer Hell" I finally got to speak to a person with a functioning brain.

I explained my dilemma, asked politely why I could not get 60 days at the pharmacy when they would mail me a 90 day supply, and the nice lady said, "No problem." This woman meant it.

After about 2 minutes, she had overridden the limitation on the two prescriptions and I was off to CVS again. This time, I got my 60 day supply for only $5 more than the 30 day supply ($26). Somewhere between my house, the insurance company, and the drug store there is a mathematical black hole or some sort of arithmetical anomaly.

I guess the drug store chains and insurance companies are convinced that most people are out to abuse their prescriptions and might sue if they hurt themselves. They have rules to protect themselves, and the customers are treated like morons.

Personally, I don't think I'm a moron, and I'm willing to correct any one who makes the mistake of assuming I can't think.

Enough of this, I need to go take my blood pressure medication. :)

For My Kids and Grandkids

It’s 9:00 A.M. and I’m sitting here in my den, with my feet propped up on my Grandfather’s old roll-top desk, listening to a Beatles CD, and wondering about the changes that have occurred in my lifetime (so far) and where I fit into the scheme of things.

Most of the people I work with are younger than most of my kids, and the stuff they have not seen is fantastic. A while back, I was talking to another old fart at work, and we had a great time talking ancient history to some of the kids.

The lady I was talking to mentioned that she had been a wiz with a slide-rule. Yep, you guessed it; the kid said, “What’s a slide-rule?” It made me stop and think about what I had when I was young that makes me ancient to those folks who will be running the country in the near future. We had 45’s, and LP’s. They’ve got CD’s and MP3’s. The laser that runs my CD player was science fiction when I was a freshman at Cleveland Lutheran High School East.

I’ve been working with computers since 1970. The first machine I worked with would have filled my garage, consumed enough power in one hour to light my house for a year, and generated enough heat to cook all the meals I eat in a month. This triumph of sophistication (remember, Neil Armstrong went to the moon with computers like that one) had 32K of memory. Today, there’s more computing power in a throwaway calculator. The machine on my desk has 4000 times the memory of that computer, and needs more.

My Grandpa saw horses give way to cars. He was born before the Wright brothers flew, and died the year before the moon landing. My Dad was born 2 years after WWI ended, and saw warfare advance (?) from bolt-action rifles to ballistic missiles. I was born just after WWII, and have seen TV turn to color, to cable and to satellite. Satellites were a dream when I was in grade school, now they track rental cars and direct us to the nearest Starbucks. The Internet has replaced newsprint and TV as the source of news for most of the folks I know.

Technology has grown at an accelerating rate, and will continue as long as our society holds together well enough to support it. What my grandchildren dream of will be commonplace to their children. The sad part is that yesterday’s technology is today’s junk. When an improvement is made, the “gotta have it” gadget of a year ago winds up in a landfill.

In spite of all of this change, some things are still worth having. My grandfather’s desk, purchased in 1910, will be my son’s desk one day, and God willing, his son’s. I remember my grandmother’s rose garden when I look at my wife’s roses. I see my wife as a young woman when I look at my daughters. I see my brother and sisters as children when I look at my grandchildren.

Some things, those with real value, are immutable. Family and friends will always be worth more than a wheelbarrow full of currency. Items made with real craftsmanship will never lose their value.

But, grace and salvation will always be the greatest gift ever given to mankind.

Think about how fortunate we are to be Christians. Christianity is the only religion that requires nothing except belief for salvation. All of the world’s other religions have a “must-do list” of rules. We have “he that believes and is baptized will be saved”. The others demand works for salvation. Our works flow from the freely given salvation. Others say walk the narrow path to enlightenment. We have “today you will be with me in paradise”.

My parents gave me a great gift. They had the faith and foresight to send me to a place like LHSE, where Christ was the center of my education. God gave me a greater gift in my parents and His son.

So, where do I stand in the scheme of things? Looking back at my ancestors, I see stonemasons, ministers, teachers, engineers, ice vendors, and wire weavers. Looking forward at my children and grandchildren I see love, faith, and unlimited promise.

I guess I stand in the best place possible. I can see the future, and relate the past to those who have come after me. I can pass the values of my forebears to my children and grandchildren. I can share my faith with friends, family, and strangers.

I’m halfway down the long and winding road.

God bless you all.

Howdy

Please be gentle, I'm old, and this is my first attempt at this stuff.

Just a few details to start: I'm 60 years old, going on 15, a life-long Lutheran, happily married for 39 years to the wonderful Marilyn, have 4 grown children and 4 growing grandchildren. I was once described as a part-time database engineer and a full time adventurer. My interests include, photography, fly-fishing, keeping my Jeep and truck running, dogs, cats, grandchildren, camping with my (similarly developmentally challenged) friends and family, and just about anything else you could think of.

Future posts will include details on my planned fishing trip to Montana and "Lap of America" in July and the day to day stuff that drops into the lap of a teenager trapped in a 60-year-old body.