Winter?

Well sorts of... it's not really winter, it's the tail end of the holidays, New Years Eve. On a Thursday this year, so I got 3 full days before "winter" sets in.

And I ain't gonna think about that. It's a beautiful day, sunny, cold, stiff breeze out of the northwest. A typical Chicago winter day. I just finished clearing an inch of fresh snow off the driveways and sidewalk, and I'm sitting in the garage  typing and listening to the Monkees.

I'm liking my sound system and my new Camaro stools out in the "mancave" and I'm liking the heck out of keeping my truck warm inside. I just don't know why I've never done that before? There's really plabty of room, heck, People can get in and out both sides of the truck, no danger of whacking the Camaro with a door, even room to walk in front and behind it!

I think I need to go outside and take a few pics with my new camera. I'm gonna take it with tonight too, take lots of pics. Carol darling, thank you so much for getting me this new camera, I just love it. The old one was cool, but this one is soo light and sooo fast. It will focus in the dark, and rarely underexposes a shot. And the flash doesn't make redeye, ever.

Tonight we're going to Phil and Lorries. This has been a family tradition for a long long long time. It's probably the only real family tradition we have these days. We show up there early, and have what they call a "tempura party" I'm not sure what that means exaclty, but it involves a WOK, and a bunch of peanut oil, and various things that get dipped in batter and fried in the WOK.
Basically, it's a 4 hour or more "graze-fest." We just eat. Fried rice, egg rolls, chicken pork and shrimp, more than a half dozen doifferent veggies. There's over 20 of us, so we take turns around the WOK, grabbing a few of this and some more of that, munching a while, then moving off so someone else can have a turn, and then back again 15 or 30 minutes later to graze some more.

An adult man can eat an amazing amount of food when he spreads it over several hours of chewing.

OK, I'm mgonna go take some "winter pics" to post, finish this up, and then call Canada and see what's happening there... hmmm, Mark and Sandra are going to DanB's... they woulda left all ready, gonna hafta call a cel phone and say Hi. Then I'll find Danielle, haven't talked to "my girl" since she called on Christmas. Well damn, neither Mark nor Sandra has their cel's on. Well, you guys have fun with Dan and Valery, Dan, I'm sorry you're not talking to me anymore....

Here's some pics. It was 4:45, very much twilight. That 18-55 image stablized lens just gathered up what light there was and gave me some good pictures. They say you can't handhold slower than 1/30th, well these are from 1/20th to 1/12. solid as a rock, perfect focus, and perfect exposure.

It's a winter wonderland indeed.

Next week, it will get into real winter. 3 months of dark and cold. But for now, it's still the holidays, and I'm good with that. We're off shortly to spend a fun evening with the family, we don't do near enough of those anymore.

G'night all. Happy New Year!!

share on:facebook

twas the day after Christmas

and the whole world was vegging out, except me, who couldn't sit still on a bet.


I cleaned out the closet behind the laundry room.
I thought about cleaning the basement.
I snowblowed twice
I went out in the blizzard and paid for the new carpet we ordered, and bought Brian a new sled.

how bout some pictures?

share on:facebook

Margarita Jello Shots

Recipe:

1 3oz package lime jello
8 oz boiling water
3 oz tequila
1 oz triple sec
1/2 oz lime juice
2 ice cubes

Mix well, add booze, mix, add ice cubes, mix till melted, pour into shot glasses, refrigerate, put the toothpicks in after a couple hours in the fridge!

share on:facebook

Hey Cool!!!

I shoulda known...

The bottom disk in the Camaro's changer is...


The monkees Greatest Hits!!!

Cheer up sleepy Jean,
O what can it mean\
to a daydream believer
and a homecoming queen
share on:facebook

Seventeen... where else...

On A Place in the Sun, which was ,of course, in the Camaro's CD Magazine, where it had been since that summer of 2008 in Yellowstone.

Playing it now...

And then back to cleaning. Scubbing the mudroom floor, on my hands and knees, with a scrub brush and pine sol. Long overdue...

Seventeen, Don't it just fly by wild and free...
share on:facebook

is it Wednesday, or is it Friday?

Weird day...  Very Friday like, last workday of the week. I sold a system, those are few and far between this year. 28k if it makes it thru a 60 days trial with a money back gaurantee from the manufacturer, I'm just along for the ride.

We got the rest of our Christmas food shopping done, we're having beef tenderloin, ham, and JELLO SHOTS!!!  I even made the margarita ones. Tomorrow I'll do red ones with vodka.

Worked out in the shop for awhile. I set up my sound system, it's a logitech 3 way (2 speakers and a small subwoofer) which I can connect to my laptop. It sounds decent, not great but better than anything I've ever had in the shop before. So I'm busy ripping all my CD's onto the computer.

I wanna listen to the Monkeys, but I can't find it.

So I'm listening to Heart instead.  I like heart a lot. One of my favorite bands. Way way back, before kids, Carol and I saw Heart live at Alpine Valley, an outdoor concert, laying on a blanket under the stars while ann and Nancy flat rocked the entire state of Wisconsin.

I might have to send Danielle some Heart for her birthday. I think she'd like.

I'm trying to find Seventeen by Tim McGraw. 3 of his albums on this pc, and no seventeen. Last summer, Mark's girls got me onstage on Kareoke night, and we sang Seventeen together. First time in my life I've done Kareoke! It was fun, I wish someone had had a camera or video recorder, I woulda loved to keep that. Danielle picked the song, it was one of her favorites, we played it over and over when we went to Yellowstone a couple years ago. Hey cool, found the video. and the lyrics.

Backseat of her daddy's car
I was trying not to go too far
Kept thinking about the words the preacherman said
Lightnin' flashed across the sky
I saw love in a young girl's eyes
And that's a look you never forget

Seventeen only comes once in a lifetime
Don't it just fly by wild and free
Goin any way the wind blew, baby

Seventeen, livin on crazy dreams
Rock and roll and faded blue jeans
And standing on the edge of everything
Seventeen

Legs hangin' off the Bayou Bridge
Feedin' fish potato chips
And talkin' about the mysteries of the universe
Yeah, the world was somewhere else

We had the Summer all to ourselves
And the stars went off like fireworks

Seventeen only comes once in a lifetime
Don't it just fly by wild and free
Goin any way the wind blew, baby

Seventeen, livin on crazy dreams
Rock and roll and faded blue jeans
And standing on the edge of everything
Seventeen

Seventeen only comes once in a lifetime
Don't it just fly by wild and free
Goin any way the wind blew, baby

Seventeen, livin on crazy dreams
Rock and roll and faded blue jeans
And standing on the edge of everything
Seventeen

Damn, I  miss being Seventeen.
share on:facebook

Happy Tuesday!

Tough day, heck even tough couple days. Work is way busy, that would be a good thing. Lots of year end stuff coming to a head, lots of deals to get closed and on the books in 2009.
Maybe there is some "pentup demand"?

Between the websites, I am completely out of time. Team Camaro is being slowing driven down the highway to hell by autoforums, the mod team is on an uproar, the members are grumbling.
I'm trying to keep it together while most of the other mods are just stepping back and saying "the hell with it."

And all the while I just started a competing forum, and I'm need to work much harder than I have been over there.

And if I ever see another blue fade flash ad trying to pitch caddies, buicks, chevy equinox's and whatever... autoforum has stuck one on team camaro, and it takes forever to load and it's giving script errors and locking things up.

sorry. It's frustrating. Spent 2 hours on Team Camaro tonight. I'da rather been over on my new site, http://www.firstgens.com/ doing a lil posting then trying to learn how to customize phpBB to get the forum looking the way I want.
share on:facebook

My brain is all a buzz...

Been working on and around the new website almost all weekend, and my head is spinning and my brain cells are sore. I managed a successful database backup, followed immediately by a software upgrade.
I got the homepage looking pretty good.
I did a lot of searching and reading about a bunch of stuff related to working with phpBB3.

and my head is spinning round and round and round.

http://www.firstgens.com/
share on:facebook

Blogging...

every day is tough. Not cause I don't have much to say, I have lots to say, heck, that's part of the problem.
And certainly not cause I don't do much, I'm always doing something.
There just isn't any time, particularly during the week.

To any that actually read this, I'll try harder.

I just finished the "outside stuff." Wow, it's a gorgeous day. Mid thirty's, 2 inches of fresh snow. The snow came down wet, so it's on top of everything, all over the pine trees, the pool fence, well you was the pic I posted this morning, the yard looks nice.

So I relocated all that snow off the driveways and sidewalk. The big craftsman snowblower made quick work of it. Shovelled the deck and up around the hot tub, and even did the old test the water and add chemicals to the hot tub thing.
Just might try getting some live humans into the hot tub on Christmas. I really don't get it. At the old house, we had this tiny hot tub down under the deck, outside the basement doors. We were in it ALL THE TIME. 2 or 3 nights a week all winter long, put the kids to bed and duck out and have a relaxing dip in the hot tub. Even used to do crazy stuff like run out in the yard and make snow angels, then run quick back into the hot tub before freezing off various "parts unmentionable."

This hit tub is MUCH nicer. Bigger, better, not off the basement or under the deck, but off the back porch and open to the sky. Still plenty private. But we never use it anymore. :(

How about a "final thumb checkup"?

Yup, we'll call this a final. It's still kinda miss shapen, needs to grow back a few layers of skin here and there. But it's healed. I can use it again with no or little pain. Buttoning my jeans is no longer nearly impossible, and it will work my zipper again. While I'm left handed, there are certain things that just take a right hand to do. Like Pants.

Just so you remember where this started 2 months ago, here's the first public picture of "The THUMB!" taken October 10.

and of course, the culprit in all her ugly guilt

So, be careful with those things.

Adjust the blade height so it JUST pentrates the work.

Use a pushstick

Don't throw away the blade guard

Replace the blade every once in a while

The blade that cut me was nearly 20 years old, it took real work to push a piece of wood thru it. Ya, it still cut smooth, carbide tip blades always will, but it was old and badly needed replacement. The new blade cuts like a hot knife thru butter. The new blade would not have cut me.

share on:facebook

Happy Birthday...

... to ME!!!         Yes indeed, rolled another year under the drag radials yesterday, I am now 52 years young. For our birthday celebration, I came home from work to find the entire block bathed in total darkness! Yup, no power. Piled the family into my pickup as Carol's family truckster was trapped in the garage by the non-functional electric garage door opener and went out for a good steak.

When we moved to Yorkville, 8 years ago or so, it was a sleepy lil river town on the very edge of suburbia. We had a jewel foodstore, a couple gas stations, an ancient 50's style open air inside out outdoor shopping center that was 3/4 empty, and a couple biker bars.

We said "just wait" growth will come. Well, thanks to the recession a lot of that growth has been cancelled, delayed, or simply put on hold, but just prior, all the stores got here! Both a menards and a home depot, several walgreens drugstores (like starbucks, they build on every corner!) and SEVERAL really good resturants.

So we went to Stonebridge, our favorite local steakhouse, and I had a birthday fillt that was very worthy of a lil steakhouse in a tiny town 55 miles from lake michigan.

And went home to find the power still out.

So I brought in some wood and got a fire going, Carol lit some candles, and we settled back for an old fashioned evening. No TV, no computers, no videogames. Well sorta. Brian played nintendo DS. And I surfed Team Camaro on my phone.

I'd like that phone much better if I could see it. Worked fine last night with my walmart reading glasses on, makes that tiny screen read like a ten incher! But without the glasses, I see nothing but a blob. Oh well, I AM NOT OLD. I REFUSE TO BE OLD. At least I only have to wear the damned glasses to read. Still, it's annoying to not be able to see ANYTHING closer than 4 feet in front on my face.

So what was I talking about? Oh yea, birthday celebrations and power outages.

So after an hour waiting for electricity, we decided to go ahead with presents. I read the cards by candlelight with my walmart reading glasses, and found my main gift on the front porch, brought by the ups man while we were out to dinner!!! so, the birthday fairy brought me 2 seasons of "two and a half men" on DVD, 2 oairs of new jeans (Always need those!!) and.... drumrolls please... 2 nice GARAGE STOOLS!!

I'll finally have someplace to site when out in my "mancave." They are "some assembly required" but they are bar hieght, they swivel, they have short backs, and the seats say "Camaro by chevrolet"

Now I just need to setup some decent sound is the garage. It's time to experiment with a PC based sound system. I really like my bose upstairs in the sitting room, it has a hard drive and I can load all my music on it permanently and never touch a CD again. At $1300 though, kinda out of the question for the garage. So, something I can plug into my computer.

To close for now, here's a pic out my sitting room window this morning. We got 2" of snow overnight, and it's not real cold, so they stuff stuck to everything, looks very cool.

Later on, I'll do what will be the last "thumb update" but I don't feel like it right now.

share on:facebook

busy weekend time 4 bed...

Got to spend most of the day at Heritage Woods helping move my Mom to a different room. Big thanks to Carol for coming back with me and helpin g her get all her "stuff" put away and organized.

The new website http://www.firstgens.com/ is rolling along. Wish I could find it in me to make a nice banner page, but haven't yet.
Started photoshopping pictures for an event review on our trip to vegas for the street machine nationals.
Here, have a pic of the southsiders at Hooters, I'm going to bed.

share on:facebook

Happy Saturday!

Finally that 2000 mile back and forth week to Kentucky is over. Guess it serves me right for not doin it right the first time?
Though I saw nuttin wrong with the system the second visit... Warrantee board swap and I'm out and gone.

This is gonna be one busy busy weekend tho...
Clean the house
Trim the Christmas tree
Get the rock hard snow / ice off the driveways and sidewalk.
Make Christmas cookies.
and
Make a proper banner page for the new buliten board!

For those who haven't been there yet, come on out to http://www.firstgens.com/ and say hello. Join up, put up an  avatar (yes, they are allowed!) and post a picture of your Camaro or what ever (yes, direct attachments are allowed too, no more photobucket.)
share on:facebook

Back to my (cold!!!!) world.

Good morning all. I made it home from Kentucky last night, after a good 2 1/2 day roadtrip.

Colder than a wtiches you know what out there today, single digits and windy.
Trying hard to figure out what if anything I missed at the office, people are talking to me like I should know this stuff by osmosis or something, lol.
share on:facebook

Kentucky?

Well actually southern Ohio right now, found a place to bed down a lil east of Cincinatti.
So tomorrow I go to the local newspapers in Maysville KY to stupidvise an upgrade being done be another company, to some equipment that feeds into the stuff I take care of.

On this trip, I also get to do a maintenance call in elizebethtown, KY, and hopefully sign a maintenance contract with the Enquirer in Cincinati!

And I get to miss a promised good sized snowfall. It should be a productive trip.

The new website http://www.firstgens.com/ is up to a dozen members now, and over 50 posts.
I "think" that's pretty good for 4 days? Hopefully they keep coming back. I need a real homepage, and a bunch more content. Should be working on that now, but don't feel like it.
share on:facebook

Snow?

Good morning world, and welcome to another busy Monday!

It looks like I need to saddle up and head to Kentucky earlier than I planned, getting ready to go now.

We got a dusting, maybe an inch of snow overnight. More in store later today, but I'm ditching out and heading south.

More later.
share on:facebook

Happy Sunday all!!

And I gotta say I'm sad to see another weekend draw to a close...

We got our house clean, that's always nice to say it's done. Not a "full clean" job, but pretty good. I cleaned my garage too, Ron, my BIL, came over Saturday to do brakes on his company car, so I needed to clean and get rid of all the sawdust from all the woodworking.

Saturday afternoon I laid around and watched a couple Harry Potter movies on abc family channel. Had a hard time getting motivated, Carol was working, while I know she has to work some Saturday's, that doesn't mean I have to like it.

We got some Christmas shopping done! Quite a bit actually. Dan and Brian are about handled. And we shopped for Daneille and Shelby. I can't say too much, as they read this, but I think they'll be happy. It was really fun shopping for "my girls." Carol enjoyed it too. We must have gone into a dozen "girl clothes stores" and looked at hundred of cute lil "girl outfits." We went to many other stores too, and I ain't saying what we bought. But we had fun. If they lived closer, I'd spoil em rotten. If we were invited, I'd fly my family out there after christmas, and just have fun. Cause I love em. I was blessed with 3 wonderful sons, and I love them dearly and wouldn't trade any of them for anything, but I'da made a good father for a daughter or two. Instead, I have these 2. Shelby is tiny and cute as a button. She's outgoing, and has the cutest lil giggle you ever heard. Daneille is my best friend. She's sweet, and pretty, and caring. Harder to get to know than her sister, but oh so worth the effort. It's been 5 months since our last summer holiday. I've seen Mark twice and Sandra once since then, but I miss "my girls" bad.

I think I need to go shopping again. Mark and Sandra, you don't mind if I spoil em rotten, do you?
Danielle, call me sometime when you feel like talking...
share on:facebook

It's Friday!!!

And my new website is functional.
http://www.firstgens.com/ is on the air.
I'm not sure why, I suppose we can just say "why not"?
I need to work on the appearance, not at all happy with that, get some content going, and do something with the splash page, maybe I'll feel a lil creative this weekend.
share on:facebook

That's life...

I didn't think I had a lot to say tonight, but it turns out it's been a busy couple of days.

I missed yesterday because it was Hooters night. During the colder months, the Team Camaro South Side Gang get's together at Hooters in Orland Park, IL for Food & Fellowship. We also enjoy the Beer, Margaritas, and "girls in orange shorts" We had a good turnout, maybe 8? It was a fairly late night for a bunch of old guys during the week, and a good time was had by all!

On the way, I stopped to visit my Motorhome. She's sitting at Terry's RV in Frankfort after I backed into a very large front end loader while manuvering to a dump site to dump and flush my holding tanks. Front End Loaders are made of steel and iron, and are very strong and heavy. The rear cap on a motorhome is made of fiberglass, not reinforced at all. I tapped that thing at like 2 mph, stopped as soon as I head/felt it, and did this:

I got the estimate sheet from State Farm a few days ago, you're looking at ELEVEN THOUSAND DOLLARS!!! worth of damage!!! Yikes, thank goodness for insurance.

Today was great. for the past few years, I've been the "Field Trip Dad" for Brians class at Parkview Christian Academy. I always volunteer to chaperone, and to drive unless they rent a bus. Today we went to a local charity called "Feed the Hungry Children" and spent a couple hours packaging meels for hungry kids. Here's some of Brian's classmates in action.

So, I took Brian home and stayed home after school, and got bust with my projects. I'd been working on the wood trim in the basememnt apartment where my Mom used to live, and I got that all done today. All that's left to do is hang the byfolds over the laundry closet. I got the last coasts of poly on those, so I'll just throw em up tomorrow.

And out the window, we got this

Sorry itsa lil blurry, I was hand holding it, in the dark, shutter speed was a 3 and a half seconds, so I think I didn't do too bad keeping her still.

That my friends, is our first snow. :(

I guess it's winter.

share on:facebook

failure?

yup, that's me tonight, just a failure. I almost got Brians computer working again, so that's almost good. I think it will work tomorrow, so I guess that's not quite a failure.

We loaded Windows 7 64 bit on Dann's computer today, now there's a failure. It's having a couple of driver issues, and the sound doesn't work. Dann's way too frustrated by this, and he's NO FUN when he gets like that.

I fix things for a living... I HATE being asked "why doesn't it work?"
you see, as soon as I figure out WHY it doesn't work, I'll fix it and it will no longer not work, so the question is completely irrelevant. Figuring out why is the whole trick, fixing is easy once you know what to fix. Being asked why before you've determined the answer is frustrating.

Speaking of frustrating, I'm trying to get this forum software to work. I got it installed, and it actually works, but I'm having trouble linking into it. If you go to http://www.firstgens.com/ you will see a directory, and if you click on the folder "phpBB" the BBS will open right up. I've been trying and trying to put in a very simple homepage "index.html" that only has a single line of text and a hyperlink and I just cannot for the life of me get that link to open  the BBS. It doesn't even open if you type the  whole link into your browser. http://www.firstgens.com/phpBB/index.php won't work. Anyone know the answer, pass it on please?

And lastly for tonight, I'm wondering what happened to Mark and Sandra? I talked to Sandra and both kids last week Tuesday, after Mark and I got back from Vegas. Since then, no one answers the phone or emails or pm's... I'm beginning to thing I smell bad. :(
share on:facebook

Looong busy weekend

And it's still got one more day.
Today my name was mostly woodwork. Since I finished the stairs Thursday, the project of the week became completing the basement apartment that used to be my Mom's. I'd never really finished it, it's tough when someone is living there... So Friday I started trimming out the batheroom. I had enough pieces finished to do most, had all the baseboard, linen closet door and frame, and such. but I did run out, so had to make a bunch more peices. The kitchen was missing a louvered bifold door, jamb, trim, etc, so I did those too.

Just finished the last coat of poly, so the garage is full of finished woodwork.

Carol and I spent the afternoon working on things at her studio, too. I got back on the roof, and this time I think I got that leaky skylight sealed for sure. Also filled 6 more bags with leaves. 3 more tommorrow ought to do it. Also need to fix the drywall around the leaky skylight.

I tried figuring out how to install phpBB, but so far I'm a failure. It says it can't log into the database, I think I'm making some sort of syntax error in the user name or database name. Gonna work on that some tonight. Anyone wants to post up some ideas for the homepage at firstgens.com, lemme hear em.
share on:facebook

jimragtop.com is back!!!

Well, it turned out to be a major brain fart on my part. Last week, my router went kaput. Some digging revealed that "mr. nobody" hit the master reset switch, resetting the router to factory settings.
Of course, all of my children denied having any knowledge of this, even Dann the 18 y o high school senior computer wiz kid denied any knowledge of a rest switch on our linksys router.

But I gotta call em as I see em. Someone did a websearch on  why our router drops our connection a couple times a day, and found a suggestion that holding down the button while powercycling the router might help. Well hell yes it helps. It resets EVERY setting in the router to factory default. PPPoe login info is gone, so no more internet. wireless name and security is gone, so no more wireless, and port forwarding and other firewall settings are gone, so no more website or jim cam.

I got everything but the last 2 working the first day.
And today I found that it helps a lot if you click on the ENABLE button in the port forwarding screen.

So... jimragtop.com is back on the air, as is the jim cam on jimragtop,com:12000 user team password camaro.

So... check out my website, and take a peek at me lounging in my recliner tonight, surfing the net with my laptop. Oreo, the black and white kitty, is on the other lazyboy.

I need to do some studying. I have a new website, http://www.firstgens.com/ Right now, there is nothing there. I need to get something going there.
share on:facebook

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Hi all, and Happy Thanksgiving!

We spent the day at Carol's sisters with most of her side of the family. It's almost weird with all the kids getting grown or near grown. Food was great, as was the company.

Before we left, that big black scab popped off the thumb. It does look like it might scab again, but it's nearly done healing now.

Seems the website and camera are down, something to do with the router trouble I had last week. Gonna have to call AT&T tech support again.

share on:facebook

Back from Vegas!!

Hi all, cheated death again. Takeoffs still equal landings, always a good thing.
I'm gonna go thru some pictures, but we had a fine fine time.

In case I don't get back here tonight, I'll leave you with a thumb update.

It's healing right up. The black thing in the middle is a scab, and it'a about ready to fall off, another day should do it. The new skin is pretty tender, but will thicken up in time.

share on:facebook

Well, the weekend is in the record books.

It was an anticlimatic finish for sure, with an hour long cleanup followed by bye run finals in pro street and outlaw 10.5.
The drag radial final was a good one, then we left after another oil down.
share on:facebook

Good morning from the strip!

First round of pro street is in the history books, outlaw 10.5 coming nest!
share on:facebook

While The Cat's Away...

Good morning and happy Sunday! This is Mrs. JimM. I thought I would write a post while the hubby is kickin' it out in Vegas with his buddy from up there in Ya-Hey-Der land. Oh by the way, he cashed in MY American Airlines miles for that FIRST CLASS ticket to sin city. Still not sure what that's gonna cost him! Especially since I seem to be left behind taking care of lots of stuff around the house. Yesterday was really special! I took Brian to his school for a work day (he needed the community service hours for Boy Scouts), and got to spend 3 hours cleaning his school. We washed windows and cleaned the pre-school room, but the best part was unboxing and cleaning the school's really old Christmas tree. This involved taking all the teeny tiny little pieces outside, swishing them around in a bin full of cleaning solution and rinsing them off at the outside spigot. After 2 hours of this, Brian and I were soaked from head to toe and about half-frozen. Yeah, I'll get you back for this one honey! When you least expect it - BAM!.............

So since Jim is hanging out with Mark - our neighbor to the north, I figured I would poke some fun at Canadians. Why not? Its Sunday morning and I have nothing better to do. You guys know we love ya!

First up: The Top Ten Reasons To Live In British Columbia

1. You don't have to worry if it is going to rain - it's already raining
2. Vancouver: 1.5 million people and two bridges to the 'burbs
3. The local hero is a pot-smoking snowboarder
4. The local wine doesn't taste like malt vinegar
5. Your $400,000 Vancouver home is 5 hours from downtown
6. You have a university with a nude beach
7. You can throw a rock and hit three Starbucks locations
8. You have a fleet of old rusted ships that you got for free from China
9. There's always some sort of forest protest going on somewhere
10. People here never get a tan - they rust

Followed up by: The Top Ten Reasons To Live In Chicago

Except I couldn't actually find a top ten list for Chicago, so I guess we suck after all, and nobody actually knows of any good reasons to live here!

Of course, there is one good reason to live here: We have Oprah! And we like to party with her!



And finally, as seen on one my favorite websites http://www.failblog.org/

Hope you're having an awesome time honey! See you tomorrow!

share on:facebook

Hi Danielle!

Hi all, we're still in vegas!

And we're anything but boring. Danielle, thanks for filliing in for me, you done good. Sounds like you had a fun time today, glad the rain held off.

I was thinking bout calling you tonight, but we jusst weren't anyplace qiet enough. I'll call you tomorrow from the track...lol.
share on:facebook

its raining...its pouring

dad and jim are boring - we haven't heard from them much. They must be having fun in Vegas.

We had a great time at the ropes course today with Guides - zip lines and other fun stuff. Luckily it didn't rain while we were there but it has rained most of the rest of the day. It was cold though - my fingers and feet were numb. Want to go back though.

We couldn't get cream of broccoli soup at Tim Hortons so mom made some when we got home. Mom isn't sure what happened to the soup to give us the giggles but we've been laughing all evening.

Almost time for bed, will post again tomorrow.
share on:facebook

Viva Las Vegas!

Hmmm, i've no idea if this is working, buy i am in vegas
share on:facebook

Leaving on a Jet Plane

on the plane then send it l8r but something weird happened.
share on:facebook

All Thumbs

alf, but the second half may have posted. Starting right in the middle of a sentence. This is hard with only one useable thumb. I was trying to type a long post
share on:facebook

Confused

Well i have no idea what happened with my earlier posts today. I was typing on the plane and suffering from fat finger syndrome, lol. I think i lost the first h
share on:facebook

Animated Antics

, the movie is a cartoon, i read a super fchevy and 3/4 of a camaro performers, and i
share on:facebook

Flying First Class

. Nice big comfy seat, enough leg room to stash 3 small children, free beer, and a real meal that was actually good! I could get used to this real quick!

But
share on:facebook

Alcoholic Rip Offs

the $11 magarita. I think they forgot the tequila!
So i switched to beer.

Finally got on the plane, and to my surprise, seat 6f is in first class! How cool
share on:facebook

Cheap Hotels - SCARY!

Accomodations than we did, the hotel sandra booked is $20 a night! So the truck gets to sleep outside for $16 a night instead of inside for $35. I even got to r
share on:facebook

Airport Security

inal.

Once inside, i got a treat, my boarding pass saie aapriority so i got the short line at securiity. No problems there, but i didn't really think much of
share on:facebook

Parking in BooFoo

ide the train thing to the terminal, another first. In fifty years and hundreds of times in and out of o'hare, I've only done main parking and walk to the term
share on:facebook

Chicago Traffic

ly faster, the kenedy was a major parking lot today.

I parked in lot e for the first time in my life, i didn't want my truck to have better
share on:facebook

The Scenic Route

ote at another customer, and made my way out of the city. As i had plenty of time, i took the scenic route, milwuakee ave to higgins road. I think it was actual
share on:facebook

Mr. Beef

7!

So i didn't leave the officfe til 2. Dropped off an order, went to mr. Beef for a late lunch assuming they wouldn't feed me on the plane, dropped off a qu
share on:facebook

Ready to Go!

's night and i can't see squat.

Was jonesin bad at work today, it only got worse when i read the fine print and found the my flight didn't leave at 4 it was
share on:facebook

Flyin' High

Hi all! I'm somewhere over the rockie mountains, passed colorado springs and denver a lil bit ago. Weather is crystal clear all the way from chicago, too bad it
share on:facebook

Blogging From The Phone

Time to try a test from the phone, let's see what happens
share on:facebook

Off to Vegas tomorrow!!

Barely made it thru work today. Left around 3, went to heritage woods to try to help my Mom with her TIVO. Ever since Comcast went all digital, her tivo has been very confused. The cablecard got all the channels, but tivo's tv guide had no idea what was on them. So I managed to do a full setup on it, and believe it or not, it works!

Got a haircut too, if yer paying attention, it's the second hair from the left.So now Im, looking gooood for the trip. Got everything stuffed into my bad, 'cept my toothbrush and razor that I'll need in the morning, and the mini toothpaste I still need to buy. Wut's with the airlines these days, you can't bring real deoderant, and you gotta leave your shoes at the desk.

I'm hoping to line up a substitute blogger tonight, but she's off at an important girl-guides meeting and hasn't called me yet. Hopefully her mommy will read my blog and remind her to call?
In the meantime, I need to get my Walmart reading glasses and see if I can set up my windows mobile phone to talk to blogger. They say it can, heck the carned thing can do almost anything, at least they tell me it can, I dunno, can't see the darned thing without the reading glasses.

Anyway, here's where we're going http://www.streetcarsupernationals.com/oscontend.html
share on:facebook

3 days 3 days 3 days, Oh Noooo!

yes indeed, it's been 3 days since my last post to El Bloggo. Maybe it took that long for the hangover to go away? Naaa, didn't have one actually. In fact I was sober before my wife got home! Good thing, too.

Anyway, I been working on those stairs, just finished the third coat of poly, they looook goooood.....
I'll put a fourth coat on em, but they don't really need it.

Tomorrow night I'll get the last coat on, and then they'll be happy sitting there till after Vegas!

Talked to Mark a bit ago, he's sounding pretty pumped up bout our trip. It's gonna be a good time, 3 days of guys and beer and prime rib and DRAG RACING!!!
Still 2 days off though... :(

Had to spend a goodly part of the evening reprogramming my router. No one will admit to holding down the reset button, but she was all factory defualts, everything. Even had to call AT&T to get the DSL user id and password. Their customer service poeple are top notch BTW, nice, friendly, and didn't begin every sentance with "we don't support third party routers" like those others, the ones who do television, do.
So we got internet access again. Server is still restting the dynamic dns thing, so no website or cam yet.

Of course it's a good time for a thumb update. That errant digit is doing really well, Carol called me a "cell regenerating machine" a lil earlier. I got new skin except for a patch maybe 3/8" around. The black thing is even shrin king. It's definitely a scab, it's loose on one side, gonna fall off someday soon. Anywat, here's the thumb

Well, g'night all. Been a busy one, and I just need to check Team Camaro real quick before I head for my bed.

share on:facebook

denver?

Can I do this now? it's 2:10 pm saturday afternoon., looks like it's starting to cloud up and cool off, but it's been a  beautiful day. My fifth margarita is history, but I spilled the 4rth all over the counter, and half the fifth too I think, so only counts as 3 1/2. Still, I got a good buzz on. That can be my excuse.

Mark, looking forward to next weekend is vegas. May decide just not to come home. You are my  best friend without a doubt, and the two thousand plus miles from my house to yours is an endless  source of pain. That you would drive all the way here to pick up a clapped out racecar project just tells me you feel the same way. Your highest use is not to drive a truck. We can do better. And we can do it working half as hard and smiling twice as much.

Sandra, you're the best, and hopefully you will  someday decide we're not nuts completely. Yes Mark, I'm assuming your support in this drunken rambling. It just goes without saying.

Carol, you are the love of my life, this has not changed, and it never will. Look inside. You accuse me of being grouchy, I'm not, certainly not today. Today, I'm in the hot tub., alone, scrubing it out and having fun. WE ARE NOT OLD. I WILL NEVER ADMIT WE ARE OLD. I will not get old. I refuse. I am not grouchy either.  I only seem grouchy when I am forced to think like an  old grouchy person!!!!

I do truly believe, sober or not, that if you put Mark and I in the same place, great things will happen.
We are both "go get em" kind of guys. We don't sit around. We don't relax. We're not happy unless  we're going balls out on one project or another. We can make a new start. We can do what we always wanted to do. And we will support our families no matter what.

And we are known. People will pay us for our expertise. We can have our cake and eat it too.

So, let's make a plan. Let's get it done. Let's make it happen.  Paradise in the rockies is sooo close.
share on:facebook

Cat poop

Some decade or so ago, when we were first planning for our new home, we started cleaning a decade's worth of "lived in" from our existing home.

During this process, we vowed "no more smoking in the house" and "No more CATS!"

So we gave away our cats, and smoked outside or in the garage, but...  Before too long Carol brought home a kitten. And then a couple years later, the neighborhood stray had a litter in the neighbor lady's window well, and one of those ended up living here too. Now don't get me wrong, I like my cats, they are very sweet, but...  Between the 2 of them we're talking near 50 pounds of feline!!!
They shed like crazy, and they fight over who gets to sleep between Carol and I at night.

But that's not the worst. These 2 critters are so fat that they cannot properly clean themselves. Now the litter box is bad enough (Here, animal, you poop here, 30 feet from MY BED, and we will store it for a week at a time, 30 feet from my bed, and our laundry room will always smell like POOP!!!) but since they can't reach behind thier fat asses and keep thier posteriors clean, THEY TEND TO DROP "CLING-ONS"!!!
And they drop them in my bedroom and sitting room. Sometimes even on my bed!

They call me the floor nazi. I hate dirty floors. Tracked in dirt, spills, leftover food, candy wrappers, it all makes me nuts. Carpet grosses me out. The nasty stuff is down in there, you can't see it and you cannot remove it. You can play at it, yes, it fills the cup in the vacuum, and yes, the waste water in the carpet cleaning machine looks really nasty, but you can't ever get it all out. The pet hair is the worst,  no  make that second worst.

The worst is those little brown balls that go clickity clack in the vacuum cleaner. THERE SHOULD NEVER BE LITTLE BROWN BALLS ON MY BEDROOM FLOOR!!!

Ok, I feel better now. Back to work. Finishing the woodwork in the guestroom today. Getting going on the stairs. Cleaning around the pool for the winter. Draining, cleaning and refilling the hot tub. Installing the new "blend door actuator" in Dann's car and putting the dash back together. Removing the drivers door inner panel on the vette, tightening the loose outside mirror and putting that back together... dayum, I'm exhausted just typing all this, and I'm sure I forgot a few things.

Oh well, Carol left a lil bit ago to get her hair done and then do a photshoot, she'll be gone most of the day. Brian's at a scout campout. Dann as usual is in his room with the door closed playing world  of warcraft... So it's just me, but I've got a full 12 pack of corona, a bunch of limes, and a complete fresh b atch of margarita fixins. So I'll just get a good buzz on and work.
share on:facebook

Vegas here we come!!!

I bought myelf a plane ticket today... well Carol bought it with her credit card miles. I'm heading out to Las Vegas next weekend for the Street car nationals!

This will be 3 days of total insanity. "STREET" cars, with functional doors, painted on headlights, and 10 1/2" tires, running SIX second quarters at well  over 200 mph!
These cars are nuts, it's gonna be fun.

Of course Mark is joining us, as is Royce and a few other Team Camaro diehards.
Danielle, if you're reading this, hide in your Dad's  suitcase, we'll ditch the old guys and I'll show you Ceasar's Palace!

Look here for some cool  pics and videos http://www.camaros.net/forums/showthread.php?t=168730
share on:facebook

Parkview Christian Academy

had thier second annual "Taste of Africa" tonight.

Brian goes to Parkview, has since he started thier all day kindergarten many years ago. He's in sixth grade now.

This place is unbelieveable. If you ever doubt your faith, or start thinking maybe there isn't a God, go spend some time at Parkview. We are sooo lucky to be able to send our youngest son there. Yesterday, he brought home a "High Honor Roll certificate" one of 6 awards given to the 6th - 9th graders, and the only 6th grader to make the cut. He works very hard, because he loves his school and his teachers.

Because they are simply the best. When our founder and principal left 2 years ago, we though it might be the end. And then this guy Jim Apker took over, and he's proven to be just great too. Parkview has expanded into preschool and into high school, and still there are less than one hundred students. Class sizes are counted with the fingers on 2 hands. All the students get the help they need to reach there highest potential. Many excel. None are simply average.

The existance of such a place is truly a miracle. Their education of my son is a blessing.
Check them out here http://www.parkviewchristian.net/
share on:facebook

The energizer bunny?

Well almost... That bunny is not as exhausted as I am....
I almost got a little work work done today. I did have to go work on Carol's computer, and also had to deal briefly with my Mom and her tivo. Thanks Dann, for helping me out on that one!

Dog's and brats on the grill for dinner, and then back to my woodwork. I did get you guys some pics, but first, how 'bout a thumb update?
Here's tonight's thumb pic:

It really is healing, pretty quickly now. here's a pic of where I started, exactly a month ago:

So much for the gross stuff.

When we first built our timberframe house, we used carpeting on the kids level, as well as on the stairs from the mainfloor to the kids level, and up from there to the second floor master wing. Yes, master wing, well over 1000 square feet, 7 rooms (the closet, at 8 by 16 feet, qualifies as a room!)  but that's another story.

Anyway, I hate carpet. Dirty disgusting stuff, impossible to clean or keep clean. One of my projects this year has been to replace the carpet in the kids wing with hardwood. I used 5/16" prefinished wood flooring from Bruce. Great stuff, very close to the natural  finish oak we used in the great room, but considerable thinner than  the carpet and pad it replaced. So much so that there was a gap of near 1/2" between the bottom of the baseboard and the new flooring.

Regular baseshoe would not fill this gap. Kinda small aginst my 8" custom made baseboard too. (Yes, I made all the woodwork in this house, out of clear pine lumber) So I made some base shoe. Starting with clear pine 1x2, I first rounded opposte corners on the router, then ripped the strips in half, making 3/8  x 2" base moulding that was rounded over on the top edge.

Tonight I finished nailing this down in  the guestroom

You can see the hieght difference, and that I still need to remove and lower the corner block, and make a new taller doorframe block. So the guestroom is almost done. 2 corner blocks to move, and 6 new doorframe blocks to make.

I've also been changing the stairs over from carpet to oak. I got the first one done, from the main floor to the kids level:

So this past weekend I started on the other stairway, this one's a lil bigger at 9 steps instead of just 5. I got Dann to pull off the carpet and pad last weekend, and then I got all the tacks and staples off, and cut off the "toes" of the steps.

Soonly, I'll be cutting 8 steps and 9 risers ($18 and $7.75 each respectively) to exact fit, staining and varnishing them, and attaching the new parts over the old.

Meanwhile, I'm saving money for new carpet upstairs,  in the MBR and sitting room. I'd love to do that in hardwood, but the catwalk and loft are done with 3/4" finished in place oak. At $7 per square foot, that just isn't in the cards.

Someday soon, I'll get more into the house... I love our home, we built it with our own blood and sweat, and much of it with our own hands. It's a unique and special house. I'm sad that we will be moving on soon, and hope that we find a family who will enjoy and respect it as much as we have. Still, the plain and simple fact is I'm done. I need to look forward, to a time when my primary focus won't be maintaining my trophy house. Denver here we come!

So much for today, thanks for joining me.

share on:facebook

Another beautiful day!

Spent most of today over at Carol's studio. She worked me pretty hard, all 3 computers, cleaning gutters, even up on the roof sealing up a leaky skylight. I think I got everything handled pretty well though, fingers crossed!

Brian had scouts tonight, finished his first aid merit badge work, and got meal planning and such done for this weekends campout, he should fiunish his archery badge there. He was also named in his school's weekly newsletter as one of 6 students who made the "top honor role" He had 1 a- on his last report card, rest was straight A's! I'm  kinda proud of that one, he's a good kid.
share on:facebook

Back at it with a smile

Gooood Mooorning!
Another beautiful day, shower and breakfast are handled, it's 9 am, and I am back at it.

First will sand, seal, and stain those peices of base shoe I cut yesterday.
Then need to finish pulling all the carpet staples off the stairs, and trim the toe of the steps back. I didn't talk of this yesterday, as I had Dann to work on it. I'm "reskinning" the formerly carpeted stairs in Oak. I HATE carpeting!

We still have to finish moving leaves, and mowing the lawn. Also hope to wash the vette, and pull the drivers inside door panel off and tighten a loose outside mirrir.

and other stuff, it's endless. But if I'm ever to get to Denver, I need to finish me casa.
No pics, but the webcam is on, so take your own. http://www.jimragtop.com:12000/ user team p/w camaro
share on:facebook

Interactive JimDay!!!

Good Morning World!!!

It's a beautiful warm sunny autumn day in chicagoland, and I've got lots of activities planned. Shortly I'll be out in the garage for activity one, troubleshooting and repairing what appears to be a failed "blend door" in the heating system of Dann's 03 Malibu.

The webcam is on at  http://www.jimragtop.com:12000/
user is team
p/w is camaro
you have to install the active x control for it to work.

First, some breakfast.

You all pull up a chair and get comfy, I'll be out there in a minute.

If anyone has the slightest idea where to find the heater temperature blend motor on an 03 malibu, pas the info on, otherwise I'll be taking stuff apart until I find it.
share on:facebook

just another workday...

I was out and about most of today. I tried to get Mark on the phone, but he wasn't picmking up. I need Sandra to hang out the side of the pickup while Mark does a burnout and a 3 gear peel, need some good diesel audio for the "Hot Rod your Motrorhome" website.

I need a good  picture of a nice coach on a cool road (send pics to jimm1968@att.net) for the front page of the website, I'll have Carol Photoshop it doing a hairy burn out while Mark's Powerstroke does the background tunes. It'll be awesome.

Since Mark didn't answer the phone, I called grandma's house (Mark, what's your mothers name, it's impolite to call her "hey you!")
So grandma gave me a talking to about the thumb, suggesting that perhaps I should let the medical profession give me an opinion on if I will survive.
Then I got Danielle on the phone (far too briefly) and listened to her suggest the same thing...

It's good people care about me. Thank you.

But the thumb will be fine. I'm keeping it clean. taking care. Watching close. If there is any sign of infection, I'll be right off to the nurse practitioner in the walgreens drugstore. Foor now though, it's ok. Really.
Hmmm, the webcam has moved. But it's not aimed at me.
I think I'll get some ice cream and give Mark a call.
share on:facebook

Hooters!!!

It must be getting close to winter, cause our Team Camaro South Side Group had our first get together of the season.

We  meet the first Wednesday of every month, at the Hooter in Orland Park, Illinois, for adult beverages, tall tales, hot wings, and girls in orange shorts. If you're in  the area, join us next month, on December 2, 2009.

The headcount was nine. The beers were cold, and the tales were tall.
See ya all next month, here's the pics.

share on:facebook

Thumb update

hmmm, I didn't see it happen, but someone muct be on my cam cause it's aimed in a different place. Good thing I didn't pick my nose.

All I got for you today is a thumb update.
At this point I  don't even know how many weeks it's been, certainly long enough for me to be getting tired of only having one useable thumb. The worst is dealing with things like snaps, buttons, and zippers. All of these things, on men's clothing, are made to be operated with the right hand. Since I'm left handed this has never been terribly easy for me. With most of the tip of my right thumb gone, it's nearly impossible.

Tomorrow, try to button your pants using only the side of your thumb, at the first knuckle. It ain't easy.

I used a bandaid for the last 36 hours or so. This melts off all the hard crusty scab looking stuff.
Here's today's pic, a beaut, ain't it?

share on:facebook

LE Johnson Hardware

If you're house is like most, if you have sliding bypass doors in your closets, you have really cheesy hardware. When we built our house 9 years ago, we bought the hardware that menards carried, Lowes and Home Depot carry the same crap. At least the stuff is cheap, less than $20 if I'm remembering right.

Stuff is still crap though. Even looks cheap, and every time my kids so much as touch a closet door, they fall of the track. Here's a picture of the problem

and as you can see, the wheel is off the track.

After some searching, I found a company called LE Johnson Hardware, and they make some serious good stuff. High quality hardware for all types of doors. I got a total 6 of thier heavy duty bypass door hardware with valence. This is serious stuff, with an extruded alluminum double H beam track, and captured 3 wheel trucks to hold the doors. Here's a (no) comparison shot

Big difference, eh?

And here's the finished job

And my kids will never knock them off the tracks again.

share on:facebook

Working in the garage, live on cam!

Ya, I  missed a day, sorry. I'll post twice today.

Right now, I'm working in the garage on hanging some closet doors, and I am live onCam for any who want to tune in. My team Camaro buddies all ready know all about JimM's garage cam, for the rest, here's how it works:

Thne cam is actually a security cam, a DLink 5300G. It is it's own built in web server, and has power pan tilt and zoom that you can control. It's really funny to watch with new or multiple drivers, as it starts spinning in circles and pointing at the cieling and stuff. To get on, go to http://www.jimragtop.com:12000/.
Without the colon 12000, you just get my website. With the colon 12000 my server passes you to the cam.
The cam will give you a login prompt. The user ID is team, p/w is camaro If you've never logged on b 4, you'll get a prompt to install an activeX control, look for a brown bar at the top of internet explorer, click it and click install. It doesn't hurt, promise. And you only have to do it once.

Once the active X loads, the cam will come up. Right now it is in the garage, sometimes I put in in the great room in the house, and sometimes upstairs in my den. It's almost always on. Enjoy. Leave a comment here or on facebook if you get on, and ask away if you have troubles. I'm on msn as JimM, and "might" also be seen on yahoo / sbc / att.net as jimm1968 or jimragtop.
share on:facebook

Friday night quickie

It's  Friday, the workweek is over. Go do something. Why are you on the computer reading this?
share on:facebook

blog every night...

or that's what they tell me. I forgot to mention that yesterday I finally got my really cool map hung up. I found this on the web at a place called raven maps http://www.ravenmaps.com/ It's extremely cool, colored to represent elevation, it looks almost 3D. It's huge, at 37 by 58 inches, the scale is 1" to 50 miles. I got it framed yeasterday and hung it in my office to the right on my desk. I can look at it without even turning around! I wish I could have it at home, but our house is an "open floorplan" and we just don't have any walls that big. The maps looks like this:

So that was yesterday. Today I started taking my Epson 7000 apart to see if I coluld fix it. It's a really old 24 inch roll feed color printer, I want to use it to print vacation and car pictures to hang in my office and at home in my den. More progress on that tomorrow.

I took the vette home today. she's advertised on craigslist and autotrader, so I figured I'd wash her down inside and out and detail her real nice and fix / tighten a few things. So I got the pull handle reattached to the screen that covers behind the seats and started vacuuming. Well, I whacked my bad thumb on something hard enough to knock off half the scab!!! OUCH!!! THAT HURTS!!! Call me wimp, but I packed it in and went upstairs.

I found some tutorials on Microsoft Expressions web designer, so I'm trying to learn that so I can re-design and add to my webpage. BTW, my webpage is http://www.jimragtop.com/ It's all about my car, but it's very very old. I need to redo it to add n ew stuff on the car, and I want to put sections in for our travels, and also a section for this house.

Did I mention I live in a REALLY COOL HOUSE?
Hmmm, I'm annoyed. The house pics are on my wife's computer, which I cannot seem to access from my laptop. I think I'll go get em copying to the server,which I can access, while she's down in the backporch smoking. When she comes back, she'll say "Why's my computer dogging so bad?"
and I'll deny any knowledge. :)

ok cool, gottem. Our house is what's called a "Timber Frame." It's kinda built like a barn or an old fashioned church. The framing is heavy timber, joined with mortise and tenon joints secured by hardwood pags. The frame is then skinned to form the shell, but the frame remains totally exposed on the inside of the home. Here's a pic of the main frame for the great room in all it's naked glory.

If you are counting, that structure is mostly made of 7 by 11 inch lumber. Some is bigger, the bigest peices are 7 by 13 inches. The longest is 24 feet. The room defined by that frame is 55 feet long, 24 feet wide, and 24 feet tall. It's one big open room in the finished house, containing the living room, dining room, and kitchen.
When installed, that was 60,000 pounds of oak.

There is not a single metal fastener in that structure.
share on:facebook

shopping

tonight I'm shopping. The eastern slope of the rockies looks like a really cool place to be. Awesome scenery, big city nearby, very cool.

K found one, you can buy a 35 acre mountain top 15 miles from denver for $400,000!
Found a bunch of others that look cool. one 4 acre property off i70 north of evergreen that looks specially cool for running a business.

These places are right next to Denver, yet they are way out in the country, in the forest, in the mountains.
share on:facebook

So... what's the point?

This page was intended to discuss my current need to be somewhere else, to remake my existence in another place. My wife thinks I'm having a mid life crisis, she is calling it "manopause."

Really though, that's not it.

Part of the problem with writing this is so far it's mostly people I know who are reading it. They know (as do I ) how good I have it, how little I have to complain about, how much we have been blessed. Still, I'm tired of it. I'm tired of paying the interest  on  3/4 mil of mortgage debt. I'm tired of trying to keep a 4000-sf home clean. Tired of weeding seemingly endless perenial gardens. Tired of getting what's left over after paying my employees. Heck, I'm tired of having employees. 

And I'm really really tired of living in the flatlands. Corn on the right, beans on the left. Smack dab in the middle of the nations breadbasket, highest landmarks are trees and buildings.

I need to be nearer to the mountains. The outdoors. Something other than endless flat lands.

I need to simplfy my life. I need my wife, my kids, my Camaro and my motorhome. A much smaller house with a much bigger shop. LOTS more leisure time, lots more family time. And some good friends to share it with. The rest of it, well can I be done now?
share on:facebook

Court of HONOR.

Hey Hey, I did make it back in time!!!

In case you've missed it, my youngest son Brian is 12 and in sixth grade. He is a proud member of Troop 40, Boy Scouts of America, located inyorkville, Illinois, and sponsored by our local American Legion Post.

All my boys were Cub Scouts, Brian is the first to stick with it this far. He tells me he will get his Eagle, I'll be the proudest Dad in the world if he does. In the meantime, I'll be the proudest Dad in the world anyway.

Scouting is really wonderful stuff. Troop 40 is very into it and has a great group of families. To see the older boys, 16 and 17 YO's, who have stuck with it, is truly awe-inspiring. These are some serious good kids. Aware and intellegent, into the outdoors, not afraid of a hard days work, and happy to help the younger scouts and proud to be their example. While their peers are doing drugs, ditching school and getting in trouble, these boys are living these words:

On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country and to obey the Scout Law;
To help other people at all times; To keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight.

Several times a year They hold a "court of honor." Achievements are recognised, and merit badges and rank advancements are awarded. This was the first court of honor where Brian was recognised. He got a double rank advancement, earning both his scout and tenderfoot badge. He was one of 2 boys in his year to do so, many of the other nine who joined the troop last February, have not even earned thier scout badge yet. He also got 2 patches for a campout and summer camp.

Again, I am very proud of my son.

share on:facebook

Good Morning from the UP!!

I think. This eastern time kinda sucks at  first. But the bed was ok, the alarm went off, and the shower was great. Actually had water pressure. Lots. Hot  too.

The coffee is down the hall, but also very good.

So as soon as I hit post, I'm out the door and off to the  "Hoegh Pet Casket Company" in Gladstone, MI.  Yes, there really is such a place, and they really do make pet caskets and ship them worldwide. I'll try to get a pic friom my phone. The warehouse is kinda creepy, endless 20 foot tall stacks on miniature caskets!!!

ttfn
share on:facebook

Annoying weekend

I'm up here in the econolodge in escanaba michigan. Had to give up a quarter of my weekend to be ready to work up here tomorrow morning. Just the last straw in an otherwise mostly annoying weekend.

But first, a thumb update.

Saturday I took the bus to the nearest dump station, at this nasty old campgound outside of yorkville. That was my first mistake. Second was not taking a minute to wipe the rain off the backup camera...

Wait for it...

Yup, you guessed it, I backed the damned bus into a bulldozer trying to get close to the dump hole because I couldn't see because I was lazy. Actually it was a loader, one of those big ones that bend in the middle and have a buckt 10 feet wide and tires 5 feet tall. There really needs to be something stronger on the ends of the bus besides fiberglass.

On the good side, I did get the smurf doors finished Friday night.

share on:facebook

technically challenged commenters?

I did set it to allow "anonomous" but you don't want to do that cause I won't know who you are...

Select NAME / URL and just leave the url blank.
share on:facebook

Long day.

I had a lot to say tonight, but I'm just too damned tired, it's been a busy day. I took a bunch of pics, but am too lazy to resize em and post em. I did finish the smurf doors. I did take a new thumb pic. I did not injure myself on any power tools today. I'll post more tomorrow, but for now, I wanna read Team Camaro and rv.net, and go to bed.

Oh yea, I changed the setting so you do not have to log into google to comment, so let's hear from you!!!
share on:facebook

Good Morning world!!!

It's cold and rainy, but at least it's SATURDAY!!!
I slept late, till almost 8, so now I gotta get to it, get dressed and start working on those smurf doors. Busy busy day planned today.

Almost forgot, yesterday we listed Carol's studio for sale. Kind of a bittersweet thing. We just can't afford to keep it, but we (especially she) love the place, it's a very cool house and property. It could be a long time before it sells, but still it's the first step in winding things down and moving to Denver!

I had the WEIRDEST dream last night. I dreamed Danielle was getting married! In the backyard. It wasn't my backyard here, but yet it felt like home. Mark and I were working on a Camaro (it wasn't mine or his, but it "felt like mine") in the garage while everyone was getting ready. The property was full of decorations and people, and Sandra and Carol were flying around helping Danielle get ready. She was maybe 20 in the dream, and she looked totally beautiful. Her beau was a canadian guy her age. I woke up just as the ceremony was starting. It was all very weird.

Ever since I used Chantrix to quit smoking, I've had vivid dreams and remembered them. I quit over a year ago, and only took chantrix for a month, but the dreams keep coming, once a week maybe? I like the dreams, but at this point it's kinda like an acid flashback!!! I never used to remember my dreams, they would fade out within minutes of waking up.

Happy Saturday!
Jim
share on:facebook

share on:facebook

Canada is another country.

Someday soon, I'm gonna take some time and talk about the real premise of this blog, why I am taking the time to write it. But not tonight. It's late, I'm tired, and I forgot the good laptop at work, so I got no pictures and I hate the keyboard.

So a quick life update. I took the bus home, hoping to get her winterized and parked in the barn for the winter. No, not my barn, I rent part of it for storage.

I put 2 coats of poly on the second side of the smurf doors, so a lil sanding and one more coat on each side and they are done.

And for today's topic. Us ugly Americans really do need to remember that Canada is another country. A real country, not just that vacation resort up north of here. They have poeple there who call themselves Canadians (imagine that!) They're a lot like us. Even to the point that they love their country, just as we love ours.

So, when I ask my friends to pitch it all and join us and ours to carve out a new cooler life somplace else, doing what we always wanted to do rather than whatever livelyhood we happened to fall into, I REALLY need to be aware of exactly what I'm saying. This is not like running down to the local convenience store.
For some, Denver is not just a place, it's another country.
share on:facebook

Boboli!!!

Years ago, we used to make home made pizza's using Boboli crusts at least twice a month. We'd all get together in the litchen and make out own pizza. Then Brian went into his "I don't like pizza" phase, and the past few years we've skipped the Boboli.

The past month or so, Brian hads again become willing to eat store bought pizza, and today when I said "we're making Boboli, what do you want on yours?" He said "peperoni!"

So we all gathered around the kitchen counter and made us some fine pizza pies.

That was some FINE EATIN!!!
share on:facebook