It seems this weekend is all about partying for us in our merry little home, so I’ll share a music video to keep this party moving.
Have fun!
OMG, for some reason I just remembered what I would announce at the end of the night when I was a club DJ. “Drive safely getting home, ride safely when you get home.”
Such wit.
O.k., one more.
Today Earl was so sweet. He had a gift delivered to the house. I love it when he gives me presents.
Especially when it’s our old riding lawn mower!
I have not seen this lawn mower since the summer of 2004. After spending hours on it summer after summer, we decided that we would enlist the aid of a lawn service when we moved into the new house. So we let the guys at Earl’s plant borrow the lawn mower so they could tidy up around their property. With the return of my beloved friend, memories of mowing acres and acres of grass at our old home came flooding back like nobody’s business.
When Earl and I discussed my return to school and worked out the finances, we decided that the lawn service would obviously have to go. This created two issues in our home. First of all, we’d have to get the lawn mower back and actually start using it but more importantly, we’d no longer have a weekly dose of eye candy when hot lawn men came shirtless and did their business around the lawn for a little while. It’s amazing what landscapers can do to perk up landowners.
Normally I’d wait until mid June to start mowing the lawn, because after all, that’s when it’s perfect for making hay but I decided to get wild this year and start mowing the lawn right away. After all, the neighbor to our right (the original owners of our house) started mowing today and I was feeling competitive. I don’t know if this is something that happens when men get older but now I actually care about what the lawn looks like and whether it’s at the same height as the neighbor’s lawn. In the old days I wouldn’t think about cutting lawn until I could no longer see the cat standing in the middle of it.
So now I have a new way to spend an hour or two on Friday afternoons. I’ll be mowing the lawn. Maybe I’ll get wild and do it shirtless, just to perk up the old blood.
How incredibly odd is it that I just hung my head out the back door and screamed “Shut Up!” at the loud crows in the backyard?
They did quiet down though.
As my first semester as a college student comes to an end, today we had our last regular class in Sociology 101. I have loved this class the entire term and I have to admit that I’m a little sad to see it ending. It has really sparked my interest in conversation and debate as to what is going on the world today. The professor has kept the class interesting. I’m sure there are many taking the same course throughout The Empire State that see it as a requirement, personally I have regarded the entire experience as a delight.
Today was part two of our last exam (before finals). On Tuesday we had the standard multiple choice/true or false/scantron sheet type exam testing our knowledge on several chapters in the required textbooks and the class conversations over the past six weeks or so. I didn’t ace the exam but I feel that I did really well on it. The score from Tuesday’s task was 75% of the exam score. Today’s part made up for the other 25% of the score and it was a group effort.
The class started out with 80 or so students. Over the course of the semester it has shrunk down to around 40 or so. We broke off into groups of six and each group had a simple task: create utopia. Based on all that we had studied, debated and discussed, we were to create what we felt was a utopian society. After 30 minutes, we shared with the class what our community was like and if we gained members we earned more points towards the final, if we lost members we lost points.
Since the division of groups was left up to the students, it was interesting, although very predictable to see how the groups formed and the outcome of their efforts.
The young crowd that sat in the back row the entire semester, listening to their iPods for much of the discussion, formed a society called “Gotham” where there were no restrictions on drinking, drugs or sex.
The religious crowd that sat in the front row the entire semester (and whispered constantly until I ‘accidently’ kicked them in the back of the chair on more than one occasion) came up with a society who’s name escapes me but was focused on family values. They made a big deal about marriage being limited to between a man and a woman. No shockers there.
My group was an eclectic bunch. It was comprised of Maria, who is a mother of three and a year old than me, Sean, the student that tries hard to maintain that “C” while working a full-time job, Samantha, the cross country runner who always has fresh, wet hair, Brigide who made one of her handful of appearances this semester, Yurki, the very chatty 20 something that is not quite fluent in English and me. I was the spokesperson and note taker for the group (another shocker).
Our society was christened “Aipotu”. Given the task of making a civilization in 30 minutes or less (Domino’s couldn’t even deliver one in that amount of time), we were an all green society that home-schooled their children by rotating them through all the participating households (for cross-cultural and intergenerational benefits). The people of Aipotu believed in “live and let live”. The only crime would if you infringed on the rights of another, or if you did not prescribe to the “live and let live” principles. Punishment involved working manual labor (I proposed men had to be shirtless, which garnered smirks from my groupmates) in our planet friendly mines or building windmills.
In the end, no one moved from one community to another. Aipotu earned us all 25 points of this part of the exam. While that in itself was quite groovy, I must say that having an open and honest discussion with my classmates while formulating this backwards version of Utopia was an excellent way to bring this course to a close.
Now to get through the final next Thursday!
This evening Earl and I attended “A Conversation with Diane Rehm”. Diane Rehm, host of the appropriately titled “The Diane Rehm Show” on NPR by way of WAMU in Washington, D.C. was in the area to speak about her experiences as a talk show host for over twenty five years from inside the beltway.
The discussion was absolutely fascinating.
Ms. Rehm opened the conversation talking about the recent Don Imus controversy and the fact that there doesn’t seem to be much listening going on anymore. World leaders are no longer listening, the American public doesn’t seem interested in listening, no one is listening anymore. She pointed out the importance of listening to all sides of an topic, even if it’s difficult to do so because of one’s vehement opposition to the other viewpoint.
That last point is something that I am going to try to better myself at.
Ms. Rehm spoke for about ten minutes before opening the forum to questions from the audience. Many people asked questions from a wide range of topics, including the war, the news sources she uses as prep for her show, her favorite interview (Mr. Rogers, the last interview before he died) and more. I wanted to ask the question but the forum came to close before I had the opportunity.
I was going to ask her for her opinion on the blogosphere.
“The Diane Rehm Show” is broadcast daily from WAMU in Washington, D.C. It is carried on most NPR stations, including WRVO-FM here in Central New York.
Monday, April 30
Them: “Hello, this is Davidson’s Chevrolet in Rome (author’s note- caller ID says they’re calling from Watertown, over 80 miles away) and we’d like to let you know that the part you ordered has arrived. Could you please call and schedule a time to bring your car in?”
Me (ignoring the fact that she wants me to hang up and call back to schedule an appointment): “Uh, the car is already there. You looked at the problem, determined that you needed to order a part and so you did. Can you just go ahead and install it?”
Them: “I’ll call parts.”
Me: “Shouldn’t you call service?”
Them: “Yes. Thank you. Good-bye.”
Wednesday, May 2
Earl: “Hello, I’m calling to check the status of my car. The part has been in since Monday. Has it been installed?”
Them: “We are waiting for you to bring the car in.”
Earl: “You’ve had the car for the past week.”
Them: “We don’t know where it is.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thursday, April 26
Earl at the bank: “I’d like to apply for a home improvement loan.” (patio and landscaping)
HSBC: “No problem.”
They complete the application, Earl signs his life away.
HSBC: “We’ll have an answer for you on Friday, Monday at the latest. I’ll call your cell phone when I have an answer.”
Wednesday, May 2
Earl (after searching 45 minutes for the local branch phone number, since HSBC only wants you to call Singapore, Pakistan or India, depending on who’s cheapest today): “I’m calling for the status of my loan application. It’s been almost a week and I was told that I would have an answer by Monday at the latest.”
HSBC: “We don’t have any record of a loan application.”
This, gentle readers, is one of the many reasons that Old Glory is going right down the tubes. Lousy customer service has become commonplace and fully accepted in our society and no one gives a care.
This is just plain wrong.
The year was 1974. The room was numbered 104. I was in the first grade at the newly christened Lura Sharp Elementary School in Upstate New York. My teacher, Miss Kania, was a young woman that I found incredibly beautiful. She was smart and hip and pretty and had beautiful eyes. This was her first year as a first grade teacher, every year before and afterwards she taught third grade.
School officially started at 9:10. The buses started arriving around 8:45. Our bus driver, Mr. Curry, must have been a leadfoot, because bus 43 was always the first bus to arrive at school. If we had behaved during the ride, we were allowed off the bus and into the school for an informal recess before class started. If we were unruly on the bus, he’d park next to the playground and we’d just sit there, watching the other buses pass, watching our friends gather as they met each other before walking into the school, without us. He’d then let us off the bus at 9:05, leaving us just enough time to get settled before the buzzer sounded the beginning of our studies.
During the informal recess before class, Miss Kania often set up this old dinosaur of a record player. Normally used for playing records such as “Free To Be… You And Me” and instructional narration that accompanied a filmstrip, she let us bring in our favorite records to enjoy.
Scott brought in some old waltz record he’d pilfered from his parent’s collection. I don’t know why he liked those waltzes but he always did. He and Janice would try to waltz around the braided rug. He’d usually stomp on one of her feet.
Bobby (who was killed the year before we all graduated) brought in some nursery rhyme, sing-along type record. Once in a while he’d bring in something from the Mickey Mouse Club.
I always wanted to make everyone have fun dancing, so I brought in my Mom’s copy of “Rubberneckin'” by Elvis Presley. I’d get the girls to do 1st grade versions of go-go dancing and the boys would dance like monkeys all around Room 104. I cranked the music up so loud that it broke the volume knob off the old dinosaur of a record player. We ended up having to get a replacement. Miss Kania was pretty and nice, she didn’t scold me for it.
Today I stumbled upon the video for the Paul Oakenfold Remix of “Rubberneckin'” from 2003. I hope it makes you want to dance.
Just a guy with a husband. We’ve been together 28 years and he still makes me see fireworks on a daily basis. Hiker. Storm Chaser. Private Pilot. Tech Guy. Hackerish.
Weird? Eccentric!