Fun and Games Dept

One of the more frustrating things about working at the office is that I have to wear pants. Now before you jump to any conclusions about my attire when I’m working at home, I have to tell you that I have always been a “shorts” kind of guy. I like wearing shorts, especially during these hot summer months, but I have been known to wear shorts during the winter as well. Shorts and a sweatshirt works well for me.

If I can’t wear shorts for whatever reason, I need to be barefooted. I drive back and forth to the office barefooted. I have heard that this is illegal in New York State (driving barefooted) but I don’t really know how the officer sitting in the median on the interstate, talking on his cell phone, is able to tell whether I am wearing shoes or not when I’m driving. So I break this supposed law and drive barefoot. It’s quite comfortable.

This is ironic, I suppose, because I tend to wear my jump boots when I’m wearing shorts. And wearing jump boots does not lend itself to being barefooted. But I like the way boots feel (not a sneakers guy at all). At work, where I need to wear pants, I wear my engineer boots. I love my jump boots and the thought of needing to replace them makes me a little sad.

My engineer boots are off right now, as I am sitting in the Jeep in the coveted shady spot while typing this. My feet are enjoying a sigh of relief.

When I first started working from home, I started out needing to wear shoes to feel focused. This necessity isn’t holding water anymore, because last week I worked at home whilst barefooted and I got a lot done. I do wear a shirt and shorts, though. I can’t imagine talking on a conference call while in my birthday suit. Not even on my birthday.

One of the things I absolutely love about my occasionally boot-cladded, sometimes barefooted feet is when I have the opportunity to enjoy a reflexology session by a skilled person good with feet. I had this a GREAT foot massage about a year ago in a mall outside of Denver. I think I might need to seek this out again (though getting to Denver might be pricey). I’m really big on massage. I wonder why I never looked into becoming a massage therapist. I know I enjoy getting massaged and I actually enjoy rubbing people (and seeing/feeling their energy as I am doing it).

It’s all about the energy. And that’s why I like being barefooted, so I am more grounded and closer to the energy of Mother Earth. When I am barefooted I tend to feel more free.

And then I ramble more.

So this has been the first weekend of my new on-call routine as dictated by my realigned position at work. I still have the habit of comparing on-call experiences to what used to constitute my on-call routine with my old job (over two years ago). Whenever I hear a Motorola pager ring I still go into something that resembles a seizure before I throw the closest, heaviest object at a wall. Fortunately, not many people carry pagers these days. If they do, they’re probably on-call for the company I used to work at.

Not knowing how busy on-call would be, Earl and I kept it close to The Manor this weekend. Yesterday evening we ventured out to the nearby “beach” town of Sylvan Beach. This little village is situated on the eastern end of Oneida Lake. Oneida Lake is the largest inland lake within New York State and is kind of an orphan in that it’s not one of the Finger Lakes. When watching the sunset from Sylvan Beach it looks like a skinny ocean view, as the lake does reach out to the horizon.

We stopped at Eddie’s for dinner. This is your typical family restaurant affair and if memory serves correctly, a place my grandparents would go from time to time. Last night’s special was chicken and biscuits.

It was delicious.

Afterwards, Earl and I walked around the amusement area, played some skee ball and then walked up near the water.

I didn’t catch the scores in the photo. On the left I had reached 250, on the right, Earl had reached 190.

I liked the way this tree looked against the lake with the sun in the background.

The backside of the amusement park. Earl stops to take an Instagram photo.

Here’s a photo of a happy couple.

While we were in Sylvan Beach, we stopped at one of the store fronts that showed various real estate listings. We found a beautiful log cabin on 6 1/2 acres in the middle of the woods. It was a five bedroom cabin and looked relatively new. We found the place and took a gander. It’s a steal. We dreamed about it a bit and spent the rest of our ride talking about the logistics. It’s not close to anything that we need to be close to (as far as location goes) but it would be a nice getaway location.

It’s always good to dream.

All the good, shady spots near the Dunkin’ Donuts I visit at lunch time were taken. It seems there were a lot of people looking to hide out for their lunch hour, just like I tend to do. I wasn’t in the mood to broil in the sun nor did I want to sit in Dunkin’s eating area, so I decided to explore a bit and find some shade to relax in. I ended up in Downtown Johnstown, about three miles from work. I am sitting under the shade of a big maple tree on a side street. A historical marker proclaims “Site of the Residence of Matthias B. Hildreth. Served as Attorney General for the State of New York from 1808 to 1812.”

I like these historical markers that are scattered all over the Empire State. I wonder how many people read them, though. If you stop and take a few moments you can learn a few things about the area you’re currently in. I find this fascinating, because knowing our history helps us better understand our future.

Downtown Johnstown has a lot of big old houses and other old buildings scattered about. Kitty corner from where I am sitting is building proclaiming that it’s home to the Johnstown Eagles. As I type this, I know that I’ve heard of the Eagles fraternal organization but I have no idea as to what they actually do. I’ll have to hit up Wikipedia after I finish this blog entry. I know that I’ve had relatives that were Eagles, but I didn’t know what they did. I think there might have been beer involved but I could be completely off base on that.

Next door to the Eagles is another facility owned by the company I work for. It actually houses the “disaster recovery” location, as well as a few other office workers. It used to have over a hundred employees working in there, now it’s around a dozen. A co-worker once took me into the decommissioned datacenter in the basement. There’s a lot of old mainframe equipment and the like from the late 1970s to mid 1980s down there. I decided I was an old geek when I realized that my first geek gig was working on that exact same equipment (DEC VAXen, VAXstations, PDP-11s and the like). The first hard drive I changed out was the size of the freezer drawer on the new refrigerator at home. It was big at 20MB. The building itself is kind of nifty in that 50s/60s office building chic with the terrazzo floors and the like.

I really like the 50s and 60s “ranch” styles of home and businesses. Grandma and Grandpa Country’s house was a bigger ranch home custom designed and built in the late 1950s. Earl doesn’t really care for that design; the one floor plan tends to isolate folks that would otherwise be inclined to socialize during a gathering, but I think it’s a cool design. I even like the old Shell stations that were built in a ranch style. I often try to spot these during our travels.

Photo courtesy of Pleasant Family Shopping Blog.

I like old gas stations. I’ve asked for a classic (or current) Shell service man’s uniform shirt for my birthday, as Shell has always been my favorite of the service stations. I imagine it’ll be a difficult present to find.

So I have been writing code most of the morning. This means I’ve been hunched over my computer and I’ve been staring at my laptop screen. This isn’t a bad thing, after all, it is what I do for a living, but sometimes I think my office setup is not the most ergonomically efficient. Because of this, I end up with tightness in my shoulders and neck.

I just went to the chiropractor after nearly four hours of writing code. I usually take a quick break during my workday and crack my neck, shoulders and back with a good, hearty stretch, but I purposely didn’t do that this morning since I was headed to the chiropractor’s office at lunch time and I figured I might as well get my (insurance) money’s worth.

Dr. Tim noted that might upper back and shoulders seemed a little tight but that my lower back was in great shape. It’s been two weeks since my last appointment, so I figured there’d be more crunchy sounds than usual. When he adjusted my neck and back it made sounds like it’s never made before. Any tightness in my neck and shoulders immediately dissipated and the sneeze I was holding back retreated as well. It’s always good when your chiropractor says “Wow!” At least, I think it’s good. I go back in two weeks.

I feel amazing right now. And just for the record, while I do enjoy a good cracking of the neck and back, I don’t get overjoyed like this woman.

So I’m sitting in the coveted “shady spot” behind the Burger King near the shopping center I usually install myself in during my lunch hour at the office. It’s kind of a repeat performance of my Saturday blogging-parking scenario, except the Pizza Hut looks newer and there are seagulls giving me stern looks, wondering when I’m going to throw some food out one of my windows. The seagulls always hover around the Burger King in these parts.

With the storms that blew through the Midwest and West Virginia this weekend, we have been plenty busy with customers being out of telephone and broadband service. The program I wrote is tracking all these things and the server is “running hot” today. My tasks have involved keeping everything running during the busy daytime hours. Things will settle down later in the evening.

One of the field techs in Ohio sent us a shot of this 500kV tower that suffered some damage from the storms that passed through.

A lot of people are talking about how much more intense storms seem to be this year. Others are saying it’s cyclical. I heard someone mention a “superstorm” near the UK and I have to admit that’s the first time I heard the word “superstorm” in the news. It’s usually reserved for movies like “2012”.

Perhaps it’s time to start stocking up on canned goods.

So after Earl returned from the poker tournament at the casino yesterday (we’ll leave it at that), I declared that we were going to take the doors off the Jeep and go for a ride. He agreed that it would be fun.

We ended up driving towards my office to the small village of St. Johnsville, where they have a little seasonal restaurant called The Parkside. Like all seasonal restaurants that are found in a small town, the decor is decidedly local, the music on the ceiling speakers is the local country station and the food is absolutely delicious. I had a portabello panini.

After enjoying our meal we headed home, but only after I shot this photo from the parking lot of the Parkside. I found it to be a peaceful view, with mix of sun and shade, the clouds and the Moon.

My good mood carried through the night to the extent that I actually volunteered to go grocery shopping with Earl.

I passed the time by finding interesting things to photograph and dreaming up dishes I can make for supper this week. Summer isn’t complete unless you’ve included Grandma Brown’s Baked Beans in at least a dozen meals.

Grandma Brown’s Home Baked Beans are made in Mexico, New York (not that far from where I grew up). Ironically, Texas is near Mexico. They’re both near a spot called Confusion Corners, but the locals aren’t confused. The baked beans are made in a building that proclaims, “This is where Grandma Brown’s Home Baked Beans are made!” I don’t think Grandma Brown works there anymore but they probably still use her recipe. She looks pleasant enough. I once asked Grandma Country if she knew Grandma Brown and she said “no”. Grandma Country could make some kickin’ baked beans back in her day. I don’t think they ever competed at the county fair or anything though, since they hadn’t ever met.

So I am sitting in the Jeep at lunch time doing what I usually do during the week when I am at work at this time but in a different place. I am currently situated in the fine city of Rome (not Italy) enjoying the shade of some fairly tall maple trees. The sun is very warm today. The top is off the Jeep and I am enjoying a short ride around the area. Earl is playing in a pretty major poker tournament at Turning Stone Casino today. Not hearing from him is a good thing. Let’s hope it stays that way into the evening.

This parking lot is next to an old grocery store that was called Great American. Back in it’s day it wasn’t a large grocery store by any means, but it had enough traffic to warrant five or six checkout lanes. I shopped here when I lived closer to Rome back in the early 90s. In the late 90s, after the arrival of the Wal*mart Supercenter, it was closed down. I thought it would end up being abandoned but the owner of the local drive in movie theatre bought it and converted it into an eight cinema theatre. That’s right, a former grocery store that was maybe 40-50,000 square feet is now an eight theatre cinema complex. Some of the theatre only have 50-60 seats in them. One of them has the seating off center from the screen itself. The prices for admission and concessions are considerably lower than the chain theatre closest to our home but we still haven’t been here in a while. Perhaps we should patronize the local business.

The drive in theatre was ripped down late last year to be replaced by a car dealer. There was an outrage from the community about this. The car dealer decided he would build a new drive in. Signs proclaim that the new drive in is opening in the spring of 2012. I still can’t find the screen and I don’t see a list of the movies currently playing. Perhaps you need to bring an iPad or something if you want to watch a movie. I find this disappointing. Considering the car dealer left two abandoned dealerships on the other side of town to build this one (and ruined a local landmark in the process), I kind of hope that his sales suck.

My parking location allows me to view a Pizza Hut that has been there since the dawn of American civilization. It’s the traditional Pizza Hut in that it has a large red roof. You can still see the “label scar” of where the old “Pizza Hut” logo was. Slapped over it in a small corner is the new Pizza Hut logo. This is suppose to make us feel new and modern. The last time Earl and I were in that Pizza Hut there was a waitress named Laurie that had been working there since 1982. I always thought that Laurie was an odd name for her. She looked like she should be a Marilyn. Even though we go in there maybe once every five years she still remembers our drink orders. I think we might be due for a visit.

If I look over to the right I can see McDonalds that has been there since at least the mid 1970s. I always remember this particular McDonalds because Dad took the family there after visiting a local airstrip called Beck’s Grove. We had to pick him up at Beck’s Grove after flying from his home airport to this little airport solo while he was still learning how to fly. Our treat for the weekend was to go to this McDonalds. They had cash registers made by GTE that were called GTE Comp-Acct and I was fascinated by the fact that the register could intelligently group the common items in the order together in a section of the receipt called RECAP. The register was very loud when it printed the all capital letters on the receipt. I remember a lot of useless crap.

I don’t know that I’m going to drive very far today. Sitting in the shade is kind of relaxing to me. I’d sit on the back patio at home but there’s heavy machinery being operated by good looking men in our lawn. They are digging out the creek that runs behind the house so that the lawn no longer floods every time there’s a hint of rain. Earl and I are going to install a bridge once everything gets settled.

Oh, I went to the Dunkin’ Donuts near the former Griffiss Air Force Base. The large, unsweetened iced tea with lemon was $1.08 with tax. I guess they didn’t hear that they’re suppose to be part of the “Great Iced Tea Robbery”.

I have written two blog entries today and have discarded the both of them. My brain doesn’t seem to be in a literary mode today. The words aren’t flowing like they usually do. My perfectionist nature is preventing me from posting what I wrote, so we’ll go with a couple of summaries instead:

– Fox News and CNN Headline News both erroneously reported that the mandate of the Affordable Care Act had been determined to be unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. They both corrected their mistake, but honestly I think this was freudian slip on their behalf as they wanted more drama, more news, more furrowed brows and more RATINGS for their news outlets. I miss the days of Walter Kronkite doing his thing each evening. I don’t trust any of the news folks on the tube today.

– Earl and I were watching Restaurant Impossible last night when I remarked that the owner of the restaurant in question (which was somewhere in Louisiana) was a “hot Bubba”. He didn’t really agree with me (our tastes are sometimes very much aligned and at other times at complete opposite ends of the spectrum) but I think that’s the first time in my life that I uttered the phrase “hot Bubba”.

– I was feeling kind of non-committal to my mood this morning; I wasn’t sad, I wasn’t happy, I was just doin’ what needed to be done. However, right before lunch I suddenly felt a strong zap of zest and now I feel just great. I’m thinking that I ate too much at dinner last night and the digestion system was overloading the system. It’s just nature running its course.

– I read somewhere this morning that proper capitalization is important and the differences between these two sentences made me laugh out loud:

“I helped my Uncle Jack off the horse.”

“I helped my uncle jack off the horse.”

And that’s all I got.

You might find this shocking but I tend to feel most comfortable when I’m adhering to a well-thought out routine. Now I’m not talking about anything with flaming batons or silk flags, however, at times that does sound appealing, but rather, I like it when I have some sort of structure and a sense of what to expect in the next several hours of my life.

But what about your spontaneity? Well, I enjoy being spontaneous when I plan ahead for it. It’s kind of like looking at the calendar on my iPhone, noting that I have four hours of free time on Saturday, and deciding to go up to the beach and run through waves while remaining completely clothed. We’d all get a chuckle from that sort of adventure and it would be a spontaneous gesture on my own terms.

I like my own terms.

Because I am used to a routine and I tend to stick to said routine, I’m finding myself struggling a little bit with my lunch hour activities while I telecommute. Now, there is a Dunkin’ Donuts about a mile from the house (on the other side of the bridge of civilization demarkation) and I was there at 12:10 p.m., just as if I had been working from my office and gone to where my iced tea is occasionally waiting for me.

My iced tea wasn’t waiting for me. I was going to brief the counter person and his cohort about how I enjoy my iced tea to be prepared and how it could be a regular occurrence if they play their cards right, but they were busy tittering about my mustache. They thought they were talking softly, and they were, but the fact of the matter is, I can read lips.

My mustache nor I are threatened by the tittering of those that can not grow that which I have.

But I digress.

The fact of the matter is, I didn’t have a sandwich made for lunch because the bread had gone bad (but the birds apparently still love it) so I ended up completely breaking my routine by ordering an iced tea AND one of their deli sandwiches. The good thing was that I paid with the same Dunkin’ Donuts card that I use when working from the office. The tittering staff was not quite as jovial as the folks behind the counter at the more expensive Dunkin’ Donuts near work nor was there a woman with her wig on backwards. The tuna was tuna.

As I strive to build a new routine so that I feel more comfortable with my telecommuting adventures three days a week, I find myself realizing that I might have to come up with something spontaneous.

Perhaps on Friday I’ll go to the Dunkin’ Donuts in the next town.