April 2006 Archives

I signed up to ride in the annual Collin Classic event set for June 10 in McKinney. I was looking for a bike ride or something that would let me get away for a day or two, seeing as I'm always the one left at home with either the kid and the dog or just the dog. As I've mentioned before, a healthy marriage is based on time spent together and then occasionally a wee bit of time apart.

There are many bicycle rallies now and in the coming months around Texas. Note I'm talking rallies and not races. Am not now and may never be ready for prime time, plus I'm not going to ever shave my legs. The intriguing thing about the Collin Classic is that it offers a 15-mile route for those riding mountain bikes (that would be me). That path will follow the roads and then be diverted onto gravel for several miles before ending back on pavement.

If it is a fun and successful ride (as in I am able to drive myself home afterward), might be a great way to be motivated to get back into primo shape and see some new sights along the way, make some new pedal-happy friends. Maybe even get into the mood for the 2007 Urban Assault Race, and find a willing victim to join me.

Have you seen the new TV commercials for the Volkswagen Jetta? They show people driving along, talking about random stuff when, suddenly, WHAM! they are hit (usually from the side) by another vehicle. Unlike the image of crash-testing above, the ads feature quite realistic depictions of real-life wrecks. The drivers and passengers always walk away just fine, with the message being "Safe happens" and we should all be driving Jettas. While most of us won't be rushing out to buy Jettas, it is a reminder of the fragile nature of the balance between physics, driving, stupidity and objects colliding.

It's definitely a way to have the last laugh, even posthumously, when you're a skunk. Because even a dead skunk, one flattened by oblivious traffic, stinks. But does the skunk really know he stinks? Sure, he knows his smell can be a powerful force, one he can use to convince predators to seek a snack elsewhere. But does he know???

Sometimes I can tell when I have a certain man-stench odor about me. Today was not one of those days. The Petite Filet, for reasons that have been mentioned a couple of times now, is hyper-sensitive to odors. This isn't good news for her, living as the lone female in a home otherwise populated by a 3-year-old boy, a 32-year-old manboy and a big stinky dog. On occasion, we reek. Often we do so on purpose.

Apparently, I came home from work wearing eau de makemebarf, at least according to the PF. Changed my clothes. Didn't really help. Mowed the front yard and walked the dog, then showered. Still not up to sniff. Maybe it was lunch (it was "free" lunch Wednesday at work; we had Italian). Perhaps the pepperoni calzone and garlic bread basted my breath with the fire of a thousand stinkies. Tasted good going down!

Nevertheless, she will likely sleep in the guest room tonight. That's OK. I could use the extra room to stretch out. It's been a long day. But ... *sniff, sniff* I think I smell pretty darn good.

After a night's stay at a certain chain motel in Corpus Christi last weekend, I slammed them a little too hard in this space for failing to bring us extra wash cloths in a timely manner. It took two hours to get them, and they arrived as we were leaving.

Well, the motel – a La Quinta, which is Spanish for The Quinta – sent me a request to fill out a survey via e-mail. I did and was quite candid about my disappointment in the late-arriving bathroom linens. On Thursday, while I was picking up our new kitchen table, the manager of The Quinta left a sincerely apologetic phone message about the wash cloths. She said the motel had been shorted them and she had even considered going to Wal-Mart to buy extras. Because of our inconvenience, she refunded our money for the night.

That, friends, is customer service. And it has restored our faith in The Quinta.

This weekend, we marked our 7th wedding anniversary at The Omni Mandalay Hotel on the Mandalay Canal in Las Colinas (Spanish for The Colinas). What? Never heard of the Mandalay Canal – even if you've lived in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex for years? I'm not suprised. It seems like a well-kept secret.

OK, Ye Internet People with Laptop Computers, I want to know about them.

As I may have mentioned before, our family is going to get bigger late this year. That means our house is going to get smaller. So we need a plan.

We're talking multi-purpose rooms throughout the house to maximize the space and ensure every square foot is doing at least double duty. We will have to do quite a purging of stuff to make our plan work. That may include (say it isn't so!) eventually ditching the desktop computer and its space-sucking desk and investing in laptops with a wireless router for Internet neatly tucked inside a small antique cabinet.

• So, if you've got a laptop, what kind is it (bonus points if it's an Apple)?
• What do you love about it?
• What have been some of its limitations?
• What do you use it for?
• How often do you use it?
• If you take it with you, what do you carry it in?
• Do you have a traditional desktop workstation or do you go a la wireless throughout your abode?
• How long have you had it?
• Do you have/or miss your desktop computer?

Prying questions, yes, but I know how wonderful, intelligent and giving you Internet People can be. I have also heard you have a wonderful singing voice, and I don't believe what others say about your odor.

So, help? Please?

Millions of visitors travel to San Antonio, Texas, to see the famous Alamo. I am quite certain we fall into a lesser-known and rarer group of tourists ... those who bring along their own breakfast cereal.

Thousands of visitors ride the little train at Brackenridge Park near the San Antonio Zoo. I am quite certain the toy trains are placed inside – where you buy tickets to ride – at eye level for a reason. Felt less like a sucker, however, when one of the engineer dudes (had to be dragging 80) said he bought one just like it five years ago.

I have a few other pics, but they are on film (remember film?) and have yet to be developed.

Answer to the previously posted riddle: Family del T-bone is expecting the arrival of a wee one sometime late this year. It is early, so please direct your thoughts and prayers to a healthy baby, a pleasant pregnancy and sanity as the child-to-adult ratio evens out. Good grief, they could take over the house. There may also be prizes later on for best submitted name or guesses as to when the baby will arrive. Stay tuned, and thank you all for the congratulatory well-wishes.

My time is short (or rather my attention span is waning and I'm tired), but here's a list of some things we did or learned to do during our Wednesday-Saturday travels to South Texas. Photos will follow later this week ...

Here's a riddle for you: What starts out smaller than a lima bean but eventually grows and changes your life in more ways than almost anything else?

Hint: It's a positive thing, and it's not a too-mah. Stay tuned for the answer. That's all I can say for now because it's early and still "a secret."

I've got a busy day at work today, followed by a frantic night of packing for our four-night family getaway. I will be Webless (you should try it sometime), so I leave you with three discussion topics from which to choose:

• What, if anything, does Easter mean to you?
• What do you like on your pizza?
• If you were an insect, which one would you be?

I've written about bumper stickers before, but it's now been officially long enough that I cannot remember what I wrote and am too lazy to look it up. I took the above photo this week while on my way home from work, a process that is taking longer than it used to. Gimme a bicycle lane and I bet my commuting time would actually shrink, but that's a story for another day.

I think if I drove a Volvo I'd try to hide it with wacky stickers, too. The gal driving the be-stickered car seemed like a pretty cool chick at first, maybe somebody who'd be real fun at parties until she got liquored up and started talking about politics. But I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt until she started yacking on her cell phone and not paying attention to the ... hello! ... green light! ... want ... to ... get ... home ... sometime ... today. And then she ran a red light later on, which is not cool at all. I guess I can forgive her a little, though.

P.S. I just noticed my entry from yesterday posted three times. Guess you can tell I really missed the Cutlet yesterday.

Today is kind of a sad day here. This week, the Cutlet started going to preschool five days a week. Besides the higher expense – of course worth it because he is our son for goodness sake – that means he and I no longer have our regular Thursdays together. I figured I'd lose my Cutlet Day if the office made me start working Thursdays, or when I find a new job that doesn't embrace the whole four-days-a-week schedule.

He could have stayed home today, but he loves school. Plus, it's my day to get stuff done around the house. Stuff that hasn't gotten done because of the time crunch that is our life right now. Can't imagine how fleeting time will be when he's involved in more activities. My list of things to do is trivial and a lot less important than spending a whole day just me and my son. Good thing that next week this time we'll be in San Antonio while the Petite Filet is in a daylong seminar; Thursday will be our day again. I miss him already.

Today is kind of a sad day here. This week, the Cutlet started going to preschool five days a week. Besides the higher expense – of course worth it because he is our son for goodness sake – that means he and I no longer have our regular Thursdays together. I figured I'd lose my Cutlet Day if the office made me start working Thursdays, or when I find a new job that doesn't embrace the whole four-days-a-week schedule.

He could have stayed home today, but he loves school. Plus, it's my day to get stuff done around the house. Stuff that hasn't gotten done because of the time crunch that is our life right now. Can't imagine how fleeting time will be when he's involved in more activities. My list of things to do is trivial and a lot less important than spending a whole day just me and my son. Good thing that next week this time we'll be in San Antonio while the Petite Filet is in a daylong seminar; Thursday will be our day again. I miss him already.

Today is kind of a sad day here. This week, the Cutlet started going to preschool five days a week. Besides the higher expense – of course worth it because he is our son for goodness sake – that means he and I no longer have our regular Thursdays together. I figured I'd lose my Cutlet Day if the office made me start working Thursdays, or when I find a new job that doesn't embrace the whole four-days-a-week schedule.

He could have stayed home today, but he loves school. Plus, it's my day to get stuff done around the house. Stuff that hasn't gotten done because of the time crunch that is our life right now. Can't imagine how fleeting time will be when he's involved in more activities. My list of things to do is trivial and a lot less important than spending a whole day just me and my son. Good thing that next week this time we'll be in San Antonio while the Petite Filet is in a daylong seminar; Thursday will be our day again. I miss him already.

If your car is suffering from the rigors of pollution, dirt, mud or the occassional passing cowboy (tobacco juice), it's time to soap it on up. In the interest of helping you have the cleanest car possible – while protecting the environment – I give you my Top 10 Tips for washing your wheels.

1. Start by gathering the necessary supplies, including a bucket, soft sponge, chamois for drying and soap – which should be made especially for washing cars. Dawn® may get grease out of your way, but it doesn't do much good for your paint.

2. Find a shady spot and park under it. I prefer washing my car on the grass because it sorta waters that part of the lawn, too. Note: If you do wash your car on the grass, leave it there until the water soaks in the ground or you will create muddy ruts when you drive off. It also helps if the car is in the shade long enough for the surface to cool off.

3. Yank your hose (snort) to your shady spot (double snort). Here's where you may diverge from my tips. I prefer not to use a spray nozzle, instead letting the water cascade off the surface like a mini waterfall. That reduces water-spotting and drying time when you're done. However, it also means either hopping over to the faucet to turn it off while you scrub or letting lots of wasted water dribble out while you work. That may be OK, if, like my lawn it really needs the water.

4. Hose down each part of your car before you start scrubbing. This loosens dirt and also helps cool you off if it's hot outside. Start with the roof, windshield and hood. Scrub them with lots of soap and water, then rinse. Where you go from there is your bidness, but I usually pick a side, work my way around to the rear and then hit the other side (sounds like a bad first date, doesn't it?).

5. Now it's time for the wheels. Because they are usually really nasty, I save them for last. This way the road grime doesn't make its way to your sponge while you are cleaning the paint – think sandpaper and you'll know why. I have a little brush that I use to scrub the tires, and then I work my sponge into the wheel itself. This is also a good time to clean wheel wells, mud flaps or whatever else is down there (snort!).

6. Now that you are finished washing, it's time to dry. If you didn't use a spray nozzle while rinsing your job will be easier. Simply wet your chamois and carefully sop up the water. Once again, I usually start with the roof and let gravity help me get standing water off the car. Sometimes I follow up with a soft, 100 percent cotton terry rag. Not drying a car can leave little white spots on your paint (mineral deposits) that might eventually turn into car pox that can't be washed off. Don't ask me how I know!

7. As you're drying, open the hood, trunk/hatch and doors to wipe the door sills. If you have a car made recently it probably has "limosine-style" doors that are great insulators from muck and noise while you're driving, but it means dirt gets trapped on the door sills. Save your clothes by wiping them down every time. I don't always open the hood, but sometimes some nature (acorns, seedpods, slow-moving politicians) gets trapped in the corners of it.

8. Once the ground has dried sufficiently, I usually move my car to the driveway for a good sucking (of dirt, that is). If we've been on a road trip – and the one we're going on late next week includes a sandy romp to the beach – sometimes I have to use my shop vac. Usually, the household vac will do just fine, and has a good brush for sucking out the air vents or between the seats. If you are washing someone else's car, let your hands carefully clean out all the loose change (consider it a tip).

9. The rest is details and is a matter of preference. If your carpet is really gross, buy a nice canned cleaner and use a wet rag to get the dirt out. If you have a household carpet steamer, this can help greatly. For interior windows, I bought some ammonia-free cleaner that leaves my windows streak-free and smelling great. A vinyl/plastic protectant can give your dash and door panels a nice sheen, but I don't get the extra-shiny stuff. I try to keep our vehicles waxed (done about twice a year), using only pure wax like Meguiar's®. That stuff also softens your hands while you do dishes.

Of course, there is one extremely helpful tip that, if you can find a willing person, will make the job that much better ...

It was a few months after high school graduation, and I was working part-time at the grocery store in town and going to the nearest community college (also called The Thirteenth Grade because so many of my fellow classmates ended up there, too). Anyhow, two of my fellow WHS grads (Go Pirates!) – both female – visited me about an hour before my shift ended and asked if I wanted to go see a movie with them. I accepted, and they picked me up at my house after I'd changed clothes.

Of course, they didn't tell me where we were going or which movie. Turned out to be the dollar theater, and it was Basic Instinct. OK, back the boat up a minute.