Transitions.

The unofficial end of summer is now a memory. The youngsters head back to school tomorrow. Mother Nature is readying her paintbrush to give us a vivid display of reds, oranges and golds. You know what that means.

Football season is upon us.

I have become quite accustomed to being a football husbear. For the past 11 years social calendars have been modified, satellite dishes have been installed and TiVos have purred as every minute of every Philadelphia Eagles game is documented, analyzed and mulled over.

I even ask Earl if he wants a glass of “wooder” to go with his snacks to keep the whole Philadelphia spirit alive. He’s so proud of his hometown team.

The transition to football season is particularly interesting this year, because Earl has been giving poker the same amount of interest for god knows how long. We sat down for a little evening snack just a few moments ago when he flicked on the television set. The channel of choice was GSN, the hip name of the Game Show Network.

“Oh, are we going to watch ‘To Tell The Truth’?”, I ask excitedly.

He mumbles something that shouldn’t really sound like “would the real idiot in the room please stand up” and lo and behold there’s the beginnings of a poker game.

“Where’s Peggy Cass?”, I inquire as … “Wait a minute, what is Welcome Back Kotter doing on the screen? I thought he was a distant memory.”

There he is Gabe Kaplan, sans bushy mustache but with a retro-chic Miami Vice thing going on, whining about the poker proceedings.

I can’t follow poker. I’m not good at cards. While others at the table are doing their best poker face, I fall victim to things such as yelling “Oh goody!” when I get an Ace. Or maybe it was a four. I don’t remember. What I do remember is a Royal Flush, which was demonstrated to me in seventh grade when the mean boys in gym tried to flush Peter Vida’s head down the toilet. That was called the Royal Flush.

So Welcome Back Kotter is talking with another unshaven man about a woman named Harman and her strategy for poker. Earl goes into his poker trance, studying every nuance and stragedy exhibited on our set in technicolor, his lips silently moving as he makes mental notes. There’s no yelling of “Yeah!” or “Go!” like during an Eagles game. I find this unnerving. He just sits there, studying. Me? I don’t get the attraction and I decide to blog instead.

At least football has hot looking uniforms.

4 September 2007 by Ponderings and Musings 1

The Great New York State Fair.

State Fair 2007

Earl and I made our annual pilgramage to “The Great New York State Fair”. Today is the last day of the festivities.

I’ve been going to the fair for as long as I can remember. What was a fun family activity for me as a child has turned into a fun family activity for me as an adult. As kids, Mom and Dad would load us into the car, stop at my grandparents to pick up my cousin Jean and then take us to the fair to enjoy all the exhibits, the food and maybe a few rides. Mom and Dad were quick to teach us that the rides weren’t the most important thing at the fair because there were plenty of other things to see and do, what with all the livestock shows, the Center of Progress building, the Horticulture building and whatnot.

This year Earl and I didn’t even go on the midway. I don’t think we were into it as much as we have been in the past or something because we both found ourselves irritated by the huge number of Wal*mart-esque people carts motoring around the grounds. Now this is going to sound particularly nasty on my part, but I couldn’t help by almost sneer at the woman who could have easily used TWO of those carts to move around eating a fried blooming onion*. When her pudgy grandchild (judging by age) went to grab a ‘petal’ from the blooming onion, she reminded him that she had fries and pulled away! To keep things interesting there were also several of the latest model baby-buggies without children being pushed around in a weapon-like manner.

Nevertheless, we walked through the barns so that I could chat with the animals and ask how the Fair was this year. Those that stayed until the last day seemed relatively happy, however, because it was the last day of the Fair many had already left and the farmers that live with their animals in the barn for the 10 days of the fair had packed up. I like seeing the woofsters in their living arrangements.

Earl and I also took a peek at the table decorating display and subsequent awards. I’ve always found this to be interesting. To think there are actually clubs out there that compete as to who can build the most impressive table setting based around a theme. This year’s theme was The Orient. I found many of the entries to be quite impressive but the judges didn’t agree: “The sizes of the mums contradict the size of the serving plate.”

And so goes another year at the Fair. In the spirit of tradition, we ran into my cousin Jean and her family which was nice. I’m always a little sad to see the Fair come to an end though, because it means that the end of summer is here.

Per wikipedia: “A single Blooming Onion has been reported as containing 2210 calories and 134 grams of fat.”

3 September 2007 by Fun and Games Dept 1

Favorite.

This is one my favorite dance tracks of all time. The lyrics always bring a tear to my eye. Enjoy.

1 September 2007 by DJ 0

Bueller? Bueller?

So I’ve completed my first week of back to school. It has been an interesting week getting acclimated with the schedule and doing that whole time management thing so that I am able to work and study, get to class on time and fit some playtime in as well.

For the first time since returning to college I have a professor that I really don’t care for. He seems like a nice enough guy in that he has a friendly demeanor and whatnot but he is completely devoid of social or lecturing skills. It’s like he becomes a pod person as soon as the class starts. His voice falls to this flat monotone and then for 50 minutes, four days a week he stands in the front of the room, writes on the board by banging his chalk like some warped IBM Selectric or crazy teletype machine and talks to the wall that’s holding up the blackboard. When he’s not talking to the wall, he’s talking to someone that’s apparently outside of this universe because he sort of has conversations with this invisible person. Today he told the wall that “they’re bored”. Once in a great while he’ll turn around and seem rather startled by the fact that he has a room of 30 students sitting there. Occasionally he’ll ask the wall if it has any questions and then he’ll move on without waiting for an answer. Today he forgot to take attendance and started beckoning the exiting students back into the classroom after half the class had left.

Surprisingly, the 50 minutes tend to fly by. Perhaps it’s because of the 30 students in my class, you see, all of them are guys. At least I have something to browse while he’s having a conversation with his chalk.

31 August 2007 by College Kid. 2

Distracted.

My schedule is quickly falling into place as I make my way through my first week of this fall semester. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I have an 8:00 a.m. health class (that lasts until 10:15) and then Technical Math at 12:00, before heading to work at 1:00. Since it doesn’t really make sense for me to head home between health and math, I bring along my PowerBook so I can catch up on my online English Literature course.

I’ve never been good at English Literature. While I absolutely adore English Composition classes and I often pass time by reading anything I can get my hands on, I really dislike being told what to read and then discussing the passage with a group afterward. I don’t know if it’s the loner in me or what, but I think of reading a story or novel as a personal experience. Each reader is going to glean something different from the passage and that should be left as just that, I don’t feel the need to hash out my feelings or perceptions with others.

Hence my recent post to the online classroom discussion board regarding a character that liked to hunt other human beings: “I felt the character was too stereotypical and I was unable to shake the ‘been there, done that’ feeling I had throughout the entire passage.” Truth be known, this story probably was the inspiration for an episode of Xena.

So while I sit here outside of the library in a little cubby cubicle type setting with my PowerBook, armed with the best of intentions as to complete my English reading assignments, I find myself distracted by the various things going on around me. College campuses world wide are populated with gorgeous men and this campus is no exception to the rule. Now I’m not standing out there like some weirdo with my tongue wagging nor am I trying to pull a Republican senator in the rest room (ew!) but I do appreciate the eye candy and I thank the universe for warm weather so I can see hairy legs.

I’m also finding that I’d rather be reading blogs instead of reading these English Literature assignments. Thank goodness the assignments aren’t due for another week and a half.

30 August 2007 by College Kid. 4

Breaded Terror.

Has anyone notice that the expiration date on foods has started running out of control? Earl and I went grocery shopping a week and a half ago. We picked up the usual fare; bread, milk, orange juice, etc. It’s been 10 days and everything is still good. This seems rather unnatural to me. For example, I’m looked at our bread wrapper and it still has four days left in it, making it good for a full two weeks before it goes bad. I don’t trust this. It just doesn’t seem right. As I make my sandwich I’m constantly inspecting the crust and non-crust part (is that just called ‘bread’?), looking for the tell-tale signs of mold. There’s none to be found. I think this bread was engineered to last longer than a piece of wax fruit.

I have to admit that I have a bit of a phobia about food going bad. I can’t stand to clean out the refrigerator. Leftover gravy makes me weasy. I panic when we have bananas in the house. On the rare occasion that we buy them, I end up eating bananas like nobody’s business, overdosing on potassium in cosmic proportions lest the bananas turn brown. I mean, I seriously stress over the bananas turning brown, waking up in the middle of the night to get high on another hit of banana.

I remember the first time I saw mold. I was nine years old. I had grabbed a plain donut out of a box of donuts from the P&C, having devoured Grandma Country’s homemade donuts earlier in the week. I didn’t even glance at the donut, I just shoved part of it in my mouth during Scooby Doo on a Saturday morning. It tasted kind of odd. I turned it over and there were little pieces of green fuzz on the donut. I shrieked, startled the cat and hurled the donut into the fireplace. My father burned it the next day when he built our occasional Sunday fire. No one knew the donut was in the fireplace except me, and I watched that mold burn. Mwah ha ha ha ha ha ha.

To this day I won’t buy a box of donuts from the grocery store and I don’t trust any “sell by” dates stamped on packaging. I subtract one day from the “sell by” date and chuck it out.

I’d rather make multiple trips to the market instead of risking another fuzzy donut.

29 August 2007 by Ponderings and Musings 1

Dirty.

So another member of the Republican party has pleaded guilty to having gay sex in public places. This time it’s Senator Larry Craig of Idaho.

Color me shocked.

Before I delve into the whole hypocritical thing I have to stop for a moment and say that I don’t understand the attraction of having sex in a public bathroom. I have met and known many men whose crank is yanked by doing it in public but it’s something I just don’t get. First of all, there’s the whole sign/signal/woo-woo thing you have to do to let the person in the next stall know that you’re interested. Secondly, I treasure my parts very much and I’m not about the thrust him through a hole in a stall wall in hopes of finding Nirvana. God forbid Nirvana has teeth. Third, once you get the signs/signals/woo-woos worked out and everyone is on the same page and in the same place, there’s the whole logistics thing going on of straddling the toilet, not cutting your bare ass on the toilet paper ripper teeth and when all is said and done, doing a dismount that would make Cathy Rigby proud. I know some like the thrill of perhaps being caught and others do it in public so as not to ruin the rhythm of their bible beatings of others back with the church group but this whole public thing is not for me. Out in the wild in a private space with Mother Nature and a few friends: certainly. In an establishment that caters to that sort of thing: hey, if that makes you happy and everyone is on the same page, then go to town. In a public airport bathroom to the tune of muzak and flight delay announcements: absolutely not.

Now, how many of these politicians are going to be caught with their pants down before the American people wise up and say “Hey! These people are hypocrites.”? Perhaps one of the reasons these politicians fighting against gay marriage by proclaiming, among other things, that it’ll ruin their heterosexual marriage is because they think they’ll lose their stiffy if the gay becomes too accepted. The thrill is gone. On the other hand, and more likely the case, these guys are somewhat screwed up in the head after denying their true feelings for a number of decades.

I understand that things have changed dramatically over the last several years regarding coming out and all that is associated with it. The older generation had a different set of rules to play by and now, later in their lives, the rules are changing. Some choose to remain closeted so that they may maintain a well-established family, and you know what, that’s fine. I get that. But with all the different avenues out there for hook-ups (i.e. the internet, campgrounds, gay bars, etc.), I really don’t get the need to stop by the airport and look for some sex in a bathroom stall.

28 August 2007 by Political BS. This Ain't No CNN. 2

Back To School.

The year was 1980. I was starting my first day in the “big school”. As a new seventh grader, I had to make the transition from being the oldest in the elementary school to being the youngest in the our high school, a building the housed and mingled grades 7 through 12.

I remembering worrying about what I was going to wear. Looking back I don’t know why I was worried about it, as I never was nor have I ever been any sort of a fashionista, but having returned from a shopping excursion at the now long gone Penn Can Mall the week before, I was armed with a week’s worth of clothes before anything would need to be washed. I remember arranging my clothes on the other single bed in my room and trying to determine which to wear on each day of the week. I don’t remember what I settled on, but I imagine it was typical of the fashions of the day, perhaps just a little mismatched.

Fast-forward 17 years. Today I’m starting my second full semester of college and I am excited beyond belief. Not knowing what to wear, I’ve gone through my clothes and settled on typical J.P.-wear. My schedule is a little different this time around, with several back-to-back classes on Monday, so my backpack is a little heavy with the books I picked up last week.

Back To School.

Time to learn me some skills.

27 August 2007 by College Kid. 7

Weekends In The Woods.

So Earl and I are back from another delightful weekend at Hillside Campground in the Endless Mountains of Pennsylvania. This weekend’s theme was “Bears In The Woods III” and I can attest with nary a trace of humor in my voice there were a lot of bears in the woods at camp this year. I believe it was a sold out crowd.

Mother Nature decided the bears needed to be well done on Saturday and kept it hot and humid with temperatures in the mid 90s. Luckily, Earl and I were on a site that was mostly shade this time so it wasn’t too bad. We even made an appearance in the pool and one of heeded our swimming rule: “Remember not to get your suit wet.”

We spent much of the weekend hanging out with our friends Sean and Jeffrey and their site mates and our friends Brad and Brian from New Jersey. We also met another blogger, Rich, who was just a delight to talk with. First Earl came in late Saturday night so we had breakfast with him this morning. Earl and I love hanging out with Earl and I’m really happy that while things didn’t work out between first Earl and I years and years ago, we are able to maintain a good, solid friendship. Rich snapped a photo of Earl, Earl and I at breakfast. I stole the photo from his site.

Earl, Earl and JP

I really appreciate the fact that Hillside is it’s own little existence that’s really a step out of the daily grind of reality. If you want to get wild, there’s an opportunity to get wild. If you just want to hang out with lots of like minded guys, that’s easy to do as well. One of the great things is that there is a strong sense of community, especially among the “perms”. When Earl and I were packing up camp this morning, the guys across the road from us noticed we were struggling a little bit with pulling up the canopy stakes and offered to lend us a hand, which was much appreciated. We in turn wowed them a little bit when we flexed our muscles and moved the camper around by hand so we could easily get it out of the site.

All in all it was a great weekend. We’re heading back in two weeks for more fun!

26 August 2007 by Hillside Hillside. Ponderings and Musings 3

About J.P.

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!

All The Places

Visit my Linktree
November 2024
S M T W T F S
 12
3456789
10111213141516
17181920212223
24252627282930