The Ride On The Bike.

I’m still working on how to record video and ride a bike at the same time. Cock your head to the side at the appropriate moments in the video.

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Phone Etiquette.

Yesterday afternoon I was working on homework when the phone rang. I picked up the receiver and politely said “Hello”, as more normal Americans would do. Was I greeted with a pleasant voice in response? In this day and age, the answer is unsurprisingly no. In response to my pleasant greeting I received three blares of touch-tone goodness followed by a garbled recorded message ordering me to call DirecTV immediately at a toll-free number. Never one to jeopardize all things techie, including incoming satellite signals, I hung up the phone and called them right back.

Them: “Thank you for calling DirecTV, may I help you please?”

I responded by pressing several buttons on the telephone. I figured if DirecTV can greet me with touch-tone noises then I shall do the same forever and ever amen.

Them: “Is someone there?”

Me: “Hello?”

Them: “What is the name on this account?” (Ooh, a psychic, she already knows who I am.)

I gave her Earl’s name, since his name is on the account.

Them: “Is this Earl?”

Me: “Yes.” I love impersonating Earl.

Them: “How can I help you?”

Me: “I was told to call you.”

Them: “By whom?”

I responded with several blasts of the aforementioned touch-tone before I meekly said, “A recorded voice.” Having been in radio for several years I’ve always tried to be armed with a wide selection of character voices, but they all boil down to one: something that sounds like Bea Arthur constipated, so I settled for my regular voice with a meek twist.

Them: “Sir, your account is up to date. There was no reason to call.”

Me: “So this has been a waste of my time, your time and the time of anyone eavesdropping on this conversation.”

Them: “Yes.”

Me: “Goodbye.” I considered playing the first line of “Mary Had A Little Lamb” on the 3-2-1 keys of the phone but I opted to just hang up instead.

Time Consumption.

And the good times keep comin’! This week it’s all about the intermediate algebra, as I have two major tests, four homework assignments, a paper and a final all due before July 6. My desk is cluttered with scraps of paper with algebraic equations and my head is cluttered with variables dancing and passing like strangers in the night. I have noticed that my professor and the text book are both obsessed with mixing 20% acid solution with 60% acid solution to come up with 45% acid solution in varying amounts using various methods.

I don’t think I’ve ever mixed acid before.

The bright side of the week is the morning weather has been absolutely perfect for cycling. I’ve been getting myself up out of bed early enough to enjoy breakfast with Earl and then jumping on the bike for an hour or so. I’m loving the bike riding again and that’s keeping my head clear and my anxiety of acid solutions low.

Time to go study!

Repeat.

I have to wonder, what kind of geek gets this song stuck in his head for an entire Sunday?

School Daze.

Earl and I made what is becoming a somewhat yearly trek to my alma mater for the annual “Alumni Banquet”. This gathering is a tradition at my high school; alumni gather for a banquet and typical assembly afterwards, where we honor the current graduates and hand out almost $10,000 in scholarships. Tonight’s banquet was the 118th. The oldest alumni in attendance had graduated in 1933.

My father is currently the president of the Alumni Association. This is his first year in the role. He’s going to do it for one more year and he hinted that I should take over the duties after he’s through. Apparently no one else wants the job.

I did take the opportunity to stand up and make an announcement about my efforts getting the Alumni Marching Band together for the parade in August. It’s coming together slowly but surely. Several people are excited about the venture, so I’m glad there’s some interest out there.

I had the opportunity to visit with one of my favorite teachers from high school. Miss Chontosh (though that’s not her name anymore) joined the faculty as an 8th grade math teacher when I was in 8th grade. Today she’s the department head for the math department. I told her about my current intermediate algebra challenges in college and she told me I’d do fine. I also snuck a peek in the gymansium for the first time since graduating in 1986. It looks the same aside from a paint job or four.

It was good to walk through the old halls and reminisce a little bit.

Double Feature.




Intermission at the drive in.

Originally uploaded by bluemarvel.

Earl and I had such a good time at the West Rome Drive-In last week that we decided to relive the experience this week, except this time we stayed for the double feature.

Up tonight was “Evan Almighty” followed by “Ocean’s 13”.

At almost 39 years old, I have to admit that this is the first time in my life that I stayed for a double feature at any movie theatre. I was delighted to see the little intermission film in between the two movies. By the looks of it, the short film dated back to the late 1950s or so and reminded us that there were refreshments at the refreshment stand, we needed to stretch a little bit and to express our freedom of religion and go to church on Sunday.

It was a delightful piece of nostalgia.

Earl and I enjoyed “Evan Almighty” very much, once you take the movie for what it’s meant to be. “Ocean’s 13” was o.k.; it never really grabbed my interest, the boys seemed to sort of sleepwalk through their parts but at least there was plenty of eye candy.

I could see the whole double feature thing at the drive-in becoming our main source of Friday night entertainment during the summer.
Nostalgia.

Editor In Chief.

I have an editor in chief that insists on monitoring all my blog entries. He isn’t good at proofreading though.

Tom In Lap.

Nuclear Flirt.

Nine Mile.

Today I had to drive up to my old stomping grounds to run some errands for my high school alumni marching band. I’m trying to find a good price on t-shirts for the band members and I had a hot lead to follow up, so I made the 150 mile round trip. It was worth it, plus I got to have lunch with my mother which was very enjoyable.

I think I’ve mentioned before that I grew up in a rural part of Upstate New York, downwind from a group of nuclear power plants. I’ve always been a fan of driving along the Lake Ontario shoreline on the closest road possible, and these rides used to take me quite close to these power plants. Close, as in within hundreds of feet of the reactor buildings and cooling tower.

Since I was in the vicinity I decided to see if 9/11 had changed security measures enough to prevent me from doing this. They have. There are now big signs proclaiming the presence of security gates, requiring photo identification, on each side of the group of plants. One is no longer able to drive really close. Now you can drive only sort of close.

So I took a picture from a close as I could get to the plants. After snapping the photo a state police car came whipping by me. I have to admit this made me nervous, though I don’t know why because technically I don’t think I was doing anything wrong.

I decided to just get the heck out of there.

Pitch.

It’s been a year and a half since we welcomed my grandmother’s piano into our home. Even though the piano sits proudly in our front room, the “formal” living room, and is rightfully our piano, in my mind it shall always be my grandmother’s piano. I believe my grandfather bought it for her new back in 1949. When I sit on the bench, I can still smell the scent inherent to the instrument. I can still hear my grandmother playing her favorite song, “My Melody of Love”, made famous by Bobby Vinton.

I have played the piano on very few occasions since it’s come into our home. It didn’t survive the transport as well as I had hoped; several keys ended up in the “down” position and it hadn’t been tuned in at least two decades. But the keys that worked sounded strong and overall the piano is in otherwise great shape, so Earl and I decided it deserved a little TLC.

The kind man from Stage Music made two visits this week. On Tuesday morning he spent two hours assessing what needed to be done and he also brought the piano back to pitch (it was considerably flat). It turns out that there had been quite the family of mice living in the piano at one time, and they had snacked on the felt pads that raise the keys to their proper position. So Mr. Stage Music came back today and replaced all the felt and tweaked the pitch to perfection. To test the piano, Mr. Stage Music played a melody of lounge favorites. I noticed that he gave the piano the firm touch that it requires to make beautiful music. I’ve always been rather timid when playing this piano. This was a result of my playing the piano when I was in elementary school. I was having a loud, boisterous, joyful time with my sister, when grandpa came over and in his stern, rather bull-hornish voice proclaimed, “Do you know what refrain means?” We suspected it meant “stop and move your fingers”, as the lid to the keys was brought to a close.

We used a timid touch when we played the piano after that encounter. Thank goodness Mom and Dad babysat a piano for 20 years so that we had something to bang on.

So now my grandmother’s piano is back in her beautiful glory. I’ve never had an official piano lesson (thank god… we won’t mention the town minister that gave piano lessons only to ‘special young boys’), aside from the piano classes I didn’t finish at SUNY Fredonia. But I can plunk out a few tunes like a drunken fool from time to time, even though I can’t separate my left hand from my right hand and I don’t use the correct fingerings. See if you can identify the two songs I’m trying to play here.

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Exponential Fun.

Algebra.

Who the hell invented exponents? I think the purpose of their creation is to make my Intermediate Algebra class extremely frustrating. I can make polynomials dance with binomials in a sweet tango like nobody’s business. I can divide the friggin’ things, even if I have to shove them hard to make them come out even. But this dividing exponents thing is for the birds. They’re evil. They like to move from the numerator to the denominator position without nary a reason all because the negative sign decided to show up. I have added, subtracted, pleaded and begged for them to move to their right place but all I have to show for my work is a burned up calculator and skid marks on my eraser.

My last foray into the one question that I can’t do on my homework resulted in me determining that there’s six hectares in an airplane seat on a Boeing 747, all because the exponents wouldn’t behave as they were suppose to and get in line. They don’t obey.

I don’t like that.