Life Is Such A Sweet Insanity.

Saturday, March 8, 2003

Earl and I are on our way to Phoenix. I am currently sitting at Albany Airport.

We ended up having a nice flight. I thought the movie was an odd selection – it was “Spy Kids 2”. On the way back it’s suppose to be Barbershop, I’ll probably buy the headphones for that.

We got into our hotel around 9:30 p.m. Mountain Time. Phoenix is beautiful! Even at night. Fairly warm – 70 degrees when we landed. A decided difference from the 20-degrees we left back in Upstate N.Y.!

Earl wasn’t feeling well (he’d been feeling a little sick to his stomach all day), so we decided to order room service. We are staying at the Embassy Suites Biltmore off of Camelback – and it has an Omaha Steakhouse in it. I had a wonderful steak sandwich, and Earl ate a little bit of a “Nebraska Burger”. I hope he feels better tomorrow.

Sunday, March 9, 2003.

We got up fairly early, 8:30 to be exact. Today is “get acquainted with Phoenix day” so we decided to drive around and see what the area has to offer. We started off with breakfast at the hotel – Embassy Suites does that for free and it’s a full selection, not a limp bagel and a thimbleful of juice. I had fruit and orange juice, Earl had french toast and then we were off. We ended up driving towards Scottsdale on AZ 51 and exiting at Bell Rd. We headed east and it became Frank Lloyd Wright blvd. Our first stop – Taliesin West, the desert “camp” of Frank Lloyd Wright, the famous architect. One word – impressive. Actually, one word doesn’t do it justice as it was awesome, inspiring and beautiful. I absolutely love the “organic architecture”, building structures to be in harmony with their surrounding environment, rather than challenging them. The Sonoma Desert is good with that anyways, as all of the shopping centers, housing developments, etc. seem to blend beautifully with the desert, rather than contrasting with it.

Taliesin West, in typical Wright fashion, was built with thinking outside the box, literally. You’ll rarely find a squared off corner, anywhere. The use of glass and indigenous elements is astounding. If we’re ever rich, I would hope to honor our land with a harmonous structure for a home.

After touring Taliesen West, we headed onto “Loop 101” and stopped at a good-sized shopping center. We needed to pick up a few items from Target (it was actually called ‘Target Greatland’), including some shorts since it’s 85-degrees today. I had also picked up “King of Shaves” clear gel for the trip because it was easier to pack, but the stuff sucks. Major razor burn on my shaved head and not a really close shave at all on my face, plus Earl hated the stuff too, so we picked up a can of Foamy.

After Target we went to In and Out Burger, one of the fast food restaurant chains out here that we had originally experienced in Nevada back in ’01. They do two things – burgers and fries, it’s all fresh, never frozen, microwaved or heat lamped. Very good to eat, but very, very busy. Now we’re back at the hotel for a change of clothes, a quick breather and then we’re off hiking.

O.k., a little later. We’re back from the South Mountain Park in South Phoenix. Kind of cool. We drove up to three different summits and watched the sunset. Did a little bit of hiking while we were up there. It felt good and the sunset was stunning.

Now Earl is changing into long pants and we’re heading out to dinner before calling it a night. I think we’re going to go to “The Cheesecake Factory” which is about a block away. It’s a beautiful night, I’m looking forward to walk. This vacation is off to a beautiful start, I can’t wait to see what tomorrow holds.

Monday, March 10, 2003

Earl and I spent the day in Sedona, Arizona today. We started the morning around 9:00 with another Embassy Suites breakfast buffet, and then headed north on I-17. We gassed up in A___ Way and then headed up tothe ruins at Montezuma Castle. This place was impressive. The Indians built a five-story dwelling for about 35 people in the side of a limestone cliff. And the dwelling is about 75-100 feet above the ground. Awesome. I commented to Earl that it’s amazing what people did without “technology” – is all this man-made, fabricated stuff the way to go?

After Montezuma Castle, we stopped at Sonic for lunch. For those that haven’t been to a Sonic before, it’s “America’s Drive In”. You drive up, order and they bring it out to the car. Growing up, we had a similar restaurant called A&W. Nowadays it seems like A&W is shoved in with KFC and Taco Bell and doesn’t have a drive up in sight. Anyways, it was an excellent lunch.

We then headed up to Sedona and walked around the town a little bit after taking a short drive in Oak Creek Canyon. We climbed to a little over 7,000 feet (in the SUV) before turning back. It was a little startling, but there was snow up there.

After walking around the town we went on a jeep tour with Pink Jeep Tours. We took the sunset Broken Arrow tour. We piled into this bright pink jeep with another family of three and into wilderness we went. I hope to have pictures of the adventure on the photo gallery soon. If you’re ever in the area, we HIGHLY recommend Pink Jeep Tours. The views were breathtaking and the ride was unforgettable.

Afterwards we had a nice dinner at Heartland Café. I enjoyed a vegetarian dish. Then it was a pleasant night drive through the desert the 120 miles or so back to Phoenix.

Sedona is beautiful. Another reason for Earl and I to retire to Arizona someday. Tomorrow, we head south.

Wednesday, March 12

First of all, I didn’t write a blog entry last night simply because we were just too tired!

Earl and I started the day by heading southeast. We drove to Tucson and then headed south on Interstate 19 towards Nogales. Our first stop was the little town of Tubac for a potty break. It’s a quaint little dusty town out in the middle of the desert. Lots of arts and crafts sort of stuff. Then we went onto the Tumacacori Ruins, a church built in the early 1800s. It was sort of surreal.

After touring Tumacacori, we drove down to the border city of Nogales. We parked the car on the United States side and walked over into Mexico. It was both our first time in Mexico. Shopping is the name of the game down there! If you like to barter, go to Nogales. I bought a cheap pair of sunglasses for $8.00 (down from $15), a blanket for $30.00 (down from $35.00) and a cowboy hat for $35.00 (down from $80.00). Earl is better at bartering than I am, as he actually bought the hat and also a hanging planter for some obscenely low amount of money.

I thought getting back across the border would be hard, but all we had to do was show our licenses and what we bought.

After Nogales and lunch at a local cafe, we headed to Sabino Canyon in Tucson, where we hiked about 2 miles until sunset.

After a quick bite to eat at Cracker Barrel in Casa Grande, we headed back to the hotel and called it a night.

Today was our “wild card” day, where we didn’t have any specific plans or destination in mind. We decided to head east and ended up going to a ghost town outside of Apache Junction. We took a tour of a gold mine and did some sight seeing.

After the gold mine, we headed up the Apache Trail (which is mostly dirt) through Tortilla Flats and Apache Lake to Roosevelt Dam. The scenery was absolutely breathtaking! We took a ton of pictures which should be up on the photo gallery soon.

We had a quick lunch at Jack in the Box in Globe and then headed back to Phoenix.

The folks out here seem to be much more in touch with what’s going on around them. They are more in tune with Mother Earth. Something cities on the East Coast seem to forget about with their garish colored buildings and fast, fast attitude.

Tomorrow we head home and then embark on a little weekend getaway to round off our vacation.

Arizona has been beautiful. I can’t wait to return.

Thursday, March 13

Even as I type the date, I can’t believe that it’s March. It’s seemed like July to me. But I guess that’s what Arizona’s weather can do to you.

Earl and I are currently sitting at gate 11 in terminal 2 at Sky Harbor. He’s reading the newspaper, I’m feeling antsy. I love to people watch, but I don’t like waiting for flights. We’re flying on US Airways because of freezing rain in Cleveland. I’m strictly a Continental sort of guy, flying on US Airways will be kind of weird. We’re going through Philadelphia instead. We’ll be in Albany about any hour later than originally planned. I guess I can deal.

US Airways flight 735 from Phoenix to Philadelphia. The pilot just announced that we are somewhere over Missouri. We are experiencing light turbulence. He is leaving the fasten seatbelt light on. The flight attendants made an announcement that everyone should stay in their seat with their seatbelt fastened. So why is everyone jumping around like jumping jacks? Ignorance. Mark my words – one of them stumbles or something and they’ll be suing US Airways. I think suing should be illegal and you get what you are dealt – or what you deserve.

I have decided that if the plane goes down, I am saving Earl and myself – these fools can fend for themselves. Mostg people weren’t even paying attention o the safety demonstration – so they wouldn’t even know how to get out if they had to. I might help the girl sitting to my left, she seems nice enough and I think she’s a vegetarian.

Now there’s a woman holding onto the front door handle for support looking out the window. What the heck. I hope she doesn’t get sucked out the door and take half theplane with her!

The lady in front of me, who’s been up and down more than a whore on

Friday night, has her seat reclined as far back as it will go and she’s leaning forward to talk to her husband. I just headbutt her.

So we have a 1 1/2 hour layover in Philadelphia. I wonder if there’s a Chick-Fil-A in the airport. That would be very nice. 🙂

Earl mentioned something about going to Baltimore for the weekend, but I don’t know if we are going to or not. I doin’t know if the East Coast is getting a nor’easter or not, and if we go anywhere I want to head away from snow, not towards it.

Monday, March 17

Earl and I ended up not traveling anywhere very far this weekend – sort of. Friday we just kind of kicked back and caught our breath, and then decided to head to Albany to see “Bringing Down the House” with Queen Latifah and Steve Martin. Great, great movie.

On Saturday, we took a drive through the Catskills and ended up in Danbury, Connecticut. We went to a local mall, looked around and had dinner and headed home.

On Sunday, we headed up to my dad’s to pick up Tom (our cat). It’s really weird not having him in the house, I’m glad he’s home. Apparently he was the purr-fect gentleman up there.

And then today it was back to work. I approached work with a calm serenity today except for one little explosion. I stopped half way through and said to myself – “It’s not worth it”. My mood was decidedly better after that.

Earl and I are getting really revved up for our trip to Phoenix. I reserved a parking space at the airport for the car — they’re going to detail it while it’s there (clean it inside and out) and have it warmed up for us when we land.

Work is going well — I’m remaining focused for the most part and not getting all stressed. I’ve done a little bit of Pilates which I think is helping. Those Pilates tapes are hard!

Tonight we are going to Spaghetti Warehouse with my sister and mother. We haven’t gotten together with them in a while, so it’ll be nice.

I’m typing my blog entry on my Palm Pilot tonight. I don’t know why I’m using my Palm Pilot, except I suppose that I just enjoy using it. So here it is.

I had quite an experience last night. I did some Tai-Chi before going to bed, and it made me feel very, very calm. I felt very serene, at peace with myself. It was a beautiful feeling. Something must have hit my soul from the practice, because last night I had the first “flying” dream I’ve had in quite a while. It’s a dream I used to have quite often. The setting and circumstances were always different, but I always had the ability to fly. I would gently ride the air currents. I’m myself – my body, my face, at least as I see myself, but I have such a feeling of exhileration as I’m flying. It’s been a long time since I’ve had that dream, but it was wonderful to have it last night. My centeredness lasted much of the day. I became a little cranky towards the end of the work day, but I managed to get myself back to center. I should practiceTai-Chi more often.

I’m still studying for my MCSE certification in Windows XP. I had to switch back to Windows at work, simply because our company is too Windows-centric to try to rebel against existing systems with Linux. It was hampering my productivity, and a good manager recognizes when that happens. So I’m back on Windows XP at work. I’m using at home right now as well, though I still have SuSE installed… Linux isn’t too chatty with my Palm Pilot. I want to use my Palm more, and to do so, I guess I need to be using Windows, at least for now.

Tom went to the vet yesterday to have his teeth cleaned. He had to have a tooth pulled and during the surgery he had to have an IV for hydration. So, he has two shaved patches, one on his side for the pain patch he has, which comes off on Monday, and the other where his IV was on his front leg. He seems to be in good spirits though. Doesn’t like the antibiotics I have to give him twice a day, but who does.

I can’t believe that Earl and I are just one week away from our trip to Phoenix, Arizona. Absolutely amazing how fast time is flying these days. I really think that the clock has actually sped up! I’m looking forward to doing blog entries on the trip. I have internet access and everything.

Since Earl is in Buffalo this evening, I’m taking it easy. I think I’m going to call it an early night, read a bit and go to sleep.

Earl and I just got done watching “Joe Millionaire: The Aftermath”. Yep, I’m still a sucker for the reality shows. I can’t believe it myself, though I must admit, Zora is a very attractive woman. Evan is in desperate need of a haircut and shave though.

My mood has been cherrier the past couple of days, I think it’s because we’re nearing vacation to Phoenix, Arizona. Either that or the fact that spring is around the corner.

I’m looking forward to getting a good night’s sleep and making tomorrow another day of accomplishment.

It’s a snowy Sunday. The weatherman was saying that we were suppose to get all this snow, sleet and freezing rain yesterday. But Mother Nature decided that we should get it on Sunday so here it is. 🙂

We’ve been enjoying a laid-back weekend. Yesterday was “America’s Greatest Heart Run and Walk”, and the radio station I work for was part of it. So, up I was at 7:00 a.m. to be out on the road by 8:15. We didn’t walk, but we provided music and did live updates on the air. It was fun. Temperature was about 40 so it wasn’t too cold, but there was a persistent drizzle that we had to deal with. I have to give it up for the walkers though, it didn’t slow down the 8,000 or so runners and walkers that were raising money … all for a good cause – the American Heart Association.

Yesterday afternoon we kicked back – I did a lot of dinking around with my computer getting it just right for SuSE. Another successful Linux experiment so far. I’m having just two problems this time around:

1. I can’t get my webcam to work.

2. I can’t figure out how to sync my Palm m515 through the USB adapter.

Last night we watched a couple episodes of Xena off of TiVo and then “Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country”. We bought the DVD a couple of weeks ago. Like Star Trek V, I hadn’t seen that movie since it was originally shown in the theatres, so it was nice to see it again. I liked this one quite a bit.

I slept in this morning as I felt I needed some extra rest. Earl surprised me with waffles and sausage for breakfast – and a reasonably sized portion at that. Messed around with the computer some more and then we went to Kaufmann’s to buy a new set of luggage for our trip to Phoenix in two weeks. Ended up going grocery shopping at P & C as well. I was disappointed in P&C for two reasons – they’ve shrunk the size of the natural foods section of the store, and the very cute bag boy shaved off his beard. He’s still very cute though. And don’t think that I’m being all cheating on Earl – he thinks the bagboy is cute as well. 🙂

Now I’m updating software on my computer so I’m typing my blog entry on the iMac. His computer is so nifty. 🙂 I really like the keyboard. I tried an experiment a while back and hooked an Apple Pro keyboard up to a Windows computer. Windows had no problem with it at all, recognized it as an “Apple Pro Keyboard” and let me use it like a regular keyboard. Kind of cool. I’m thinking of getting one of these for my computer. 🙂

Had sort of a revelation today. The scent of orange really relaxes me. My favorite color has always been orange, and though I can’t wear much orange or decorate much in orange (not since 1978 or so), I do still enjoy the color, the drink and the smell. I bought this Citrus Magic all natural soap that has a nice orange scent, I think I’ll continue to use it.

I’m going to do some work on my web sites tonight and take it easy. Maybe I’ll redecorate jpnearl.com in orange! 🙂

I am sitting at my computer desk typing on my Palm Pilot as we speak. I’m not using the computer at the moment because I am installing SuSE Linux 8.1 Professional on my computer. This is going to be interesting. I tried SuSE at version 8.0 and wasn’t really happy with it, but with the rave reviews this version got, I’m hoping this experience will go better, so I’m giving it a whirl. If you want more details, you’ll have to see my geekdom entry from tonight.

Earl is in Buffalo this evening. He hasn’t been out there in a couple of weeks, but there’s been some important events coming up for the company at the Buffalo plant, so he needs to be out there tonight. Next week, he’s traveling quite a bit, I’m going to find myself having to busy myself about the house!

Tomorrow is Earl’s birthday, so I went shopping tonight at the local mall. I’m not a big fan of this mall, I think because it’s because I’m a snob and don’t like the “mini-me” version of all the stores here. Our Best Buy has one register line with only six registers. It’s 1/4 of the size of Best Buy in Syracuse. Our Barnes and Noble is like “Barnes and Noble light”. And the mall itself is clumsily outdated. A couple of months ago about 200 teenagers got into a massive fight on a Friday night in the food court, so they put these massive lights in there and took out all the trees so no one can hide. You need sunglasses and your head examined to go in there now.

I had a really wild dream last night that was really Xena-esque. I was at the local bar where I used to DJ and some thugs were picking on little guys, so I gave them the old one, two. Flipping around, yelling, throwing punches, the whole nine yards. I woke up sweating and yelling – Earl was a nervous wreck. 🙂

I’ve been rather jumpy at work and I don’t know why. I think it’s the residual effects from the winter blahs. Now that I’m conscious of it, I’m making an effort to kick it out of my system. Hmmm… interesting that I used “kick it out of my system”…maybe I have the Xena-esque thing lingering in my psyche!

I have my keyboard for the Palm Pilot setup on my desk here at work while I write this blog entry. I think it’s the easiest way for me to write things down as I think of them here at work. We’ll give this system a whirl and see how it works.

I’m feeling pretty good today. I weighed in at pre-winter weight this morning which is good news. I have to remember not to weigh myself on Mondays. It’s too depressing.

Earl is taking me to a local bike shop tonight to buy my touring bike. I am very, very excited about that! I’ve been looking at the Fuji touring bikes and have been doing reading up on what I need for gearing and such. I am really jazzed up about riding this summer. I’m going to start as soon as the roads are clear and the temperature is reasonable.

Earl and I watched the Joe Millionaire finale last night. We hate to admit it, but we had been anticipating Joe’s decision all week. It was heartwarming to see him choose Zora, the down to earth one. Got to admit it, Fox suckered us in hook, line and sinker.

I’ve decided to start watching Survivor:The Amazon. I wasn’t going to watch this season’s romp but I decided to give in and see what’s going on. It’s already on the TiVo to do list. 🙂

I haven’t written in my blog in quite a while because I havem’t been on the computer much. I know that I’ve been suffering from a severe case of the winter blahs. I got a little bit of a boost last week that helped more than I initially realized.

Last weekend, Earl decided to go on a road trip and ended meandering west across Upstate N.Y. About Rochester I saw a beautiful sight. GRASS. That’s right … grass. And while not entirely green, it was a welcome sight.

We ended up in Erie, Pa. and ate supper at Red River Roadhouse. That waving you see is me saying goodbye to vegetarianism as I enjoyed a prime rib that was out of this world.

Primed by my grass sighting, I began to get really jazzed about cycling and have been training on my stationary bike. I plan to be rather aggressive with my distance riding-with my first overnight ride on May 8.

As I’m writing this, we are on our way to Bristol, Pa. to visit Earl’s family. We just had supper at Chick-Fil-A in Allentown. I’m content.

~~~

Sunday night (Feb. 16, 2003)

A nice weekend. Earl and I hooked up with his brother Rick and Rick’s girlfriend Helen and went and saw “The Recruit”. A good movie. I enjoyed it quite a bit. Afew twists and turns in the plot that made it worth-the-while.

We visited with his dad this morning before heading out. The Philly area was hysterical because they were getting the storm of the century- something like one or two feet of snow. Big whoop. That’s everyday snow up here in Central N.Y. Oh well. It’s all a matter of perspective.

I picked up a new pack of incense while we were grocery shopping – it’s vanilla. Very soothing. Earl is even enjoying it.

We made chocolate chip cookies this evening. They are organic and taste wonderful. Last night we went to a steakhouse, my second prime rib in two weeks. 🙂 I don’t feel any worse for the wear, but let’s see what the scale says tomorrow morning. Maybe I’ll skip the scale and wait until Tuesday for my weight check. 🙂

Earl and I have decided to get rid of the DirecPC high speed internet via satellite dish. It’s not worth the money or trouble. Maybe if they perfect the technology a little more, or come out with something a little more reliable (and that doesn’t include windows), we’ll jump back on the bandwagon, but for now we’re going to stick with dial-up. It’ll also give me a chance to mess around with FreeBSD Unix for my home computer. I’ll just have to keep windows around to play SimCity and the Sims. 🙂

I think that I’m finally busting out of my cabin fever mood. The weather has warmed up finally, with it topping 32 degrees today. Plus, the sun was out, which is always good. It’s suppose to warm up to 40 by the end of the weekend, and I find that quite exciting, because we’ll be able to open the kitchen door. The rain gutters are so clogged with ice that we can’t get the door open without doing a body slam into it. I think the cat finds us crazy the way we slam in and out of the house these days.

Work has been chugging along. It’s been interesting, because we didn’t have any water in the building for the past two days. I had to walk up the street to use the bathroom. Not a good thing after you’ve had a Wendy’s Chicken Bacon salad (bad for me, I know). And considering I work in a sixteen-story building, you wouldn’t really think that we’d lose water, but we did. Something about busted pipes and the bank flooding down below. Hopefully it shorted out our checking account and plopped more money in it.

Earl and I have decided to go on vacation after all. We are going the second week of March and we’re headed to Phoenix, Ariz. (and points south). I guess he admitted that he loves the desert as much as I do. We’re still pulling all the plans together, but I am really, really, really looking forward to it.

We’ve also decided to take Valentine’s Day off and just spend the day doing something for ourselves. Whether it’s a 20 hour car ride or going wild in a hotel room, it’s going to be just for the two of us. We like doing things like that.

I’ve been reading online about this yoga sinus draining thing. I find it intriguing – its suppose to cleanse your sinuses with salt water and get rid of any infection that may be starting. I might give it a whirl and see if I can clear up this stuffy feeling.

I’ve been grooving on Xena again. I feel guilty watching the “Oh” channel because it’s suppose to be for women, but I’ll take Xena however I can get her.

I’m going to surf the web and call it a night.

I’ve decided that I have been quite moody for the past week or so. Cranky. A little bit irritable. I finally figured it out this morning. Two words. Cabin Fever. I am suffering from cabin fever.

I received a new Adventure Cycling magazine this week and it outlines the tours available for 2003. I am REALLY wishing to go on a bike ride. Soon! I want to get on my new bike and ride ride ride like the wind, there’s no doubt about it. I want to pack some camping gear and get away from it all for a couple of days. Me, my bike and the road, with Earl waiting at the end smiling.

I’m kind of frightened of the fact that I have a touch of cabin fever, since it’s still only mid-January and with the way this winter has been going, spring is probably a ways off still.

Earl was toying with me yesterday and suggested a trip to Arizona for a week this spring. How I love the desert. I would leap at the opportunity to go hang out in the desert for a couple of days. Is it my cabin fever talking? Perhaps – but I think I was meant to be a creature of the desert. There’s a whole spiritual thing for me when I think about the desert.

I’ve been playing The Sims and “Sim City 4” all day today. We picked up the new version of Sim City yesterday – I’m really enjoying it. I had two guys in my Sims family, but they refuse to hook up. What’s up with that?