Thanksgiving weekend

Well things went fairly well over the holiday weekend.

The wife and I went to Turd & Goose’s house for Thanksgiving dinner and it was good and the turkey was moist. The situation was kind of odd as the rest of our extended family was not there and it was one of two thanksgivings in recent memory where I didn’t see my mom and grandparents. The group was made up mainly of Goose’s family which mercifully is not composed of any weirdo’s and/or psychos (like ours) and are really nice people that were easy to get along with. I can’t say they had the same impression of me but hey, she is marrying my brother, not me. Besides, Steve (beef) wasn’t there so someone had to wear the hat of inappropriateness. Some other friends showed up so the young crowd was represented (holla Jigga and Murphy). Squara and Adam were there raising the roof. All in all it was a good time, thanks to Turd and Goose for the invite. Hell it could have been like some Christmases where the wife and I have spent. We were so bored out of our skulls and ended up at one of the few bars on Christmas eve asking each other “what he f@ck?”.

I wanted to do some other fun things this weekend, that plan was shut down early Friday. The wife and I were going somewhere and she informed me that there was a small lake on the passenger side floor. Without going into too much detail Paully and I spent many hours Saturday and Sunday taking apart the dash, finding the leak, fixing the leak, and putting it all back together. Could have been worse, but I also could have been hiking or something other than patching up a 14 year old car. Classic baby! I’ll tell you that nothing is more fun than going to a junk yard by yourself when it is so cold you can see your breath.

The monotony of car repairs was interrupted with a trip to the fabled Embers. I think I made an ass out of myself, per usual. It wasn’t the booze this time but the Redbulls I drank. I was so jazzed up I danced like the fat girl in the moving picture a few posts down. It was quite a site.

An early morning jem

“You know what? I don’t poop. I just have gas and it isn’t gassy gas” - the Wife

A sad day indeed

The World’s Ugliest Dog died Friday. Quite a looker if you ask me. I would take that demon spawn everywhere with me just to freak people out. Read more about this lovable hound of hell here .

Annoyances in a silent office

My job schedule runs later than most of the other staff in the office. So, I am generally by myself at the end of my day while I am catching up on various things. It used to be 3 people, including me, that shared this space. The other 2 were moved into a different area leaving me all alone. I shared a cubicle wall with one of the past occupants and that was stressful. This was before she got her hearing aid and would talk to her grandson using baby talk at an extremely loud volume. “ (gooshy voice) oh little baby grandma loves you, yes I do, have you been a good boy, I said have you been a good boy? No you need to share those toy cars with you brother it isn’t nice……” Luckily we got along really good so I could get away with throwing wadded up post-its over the wall to get her to quiet down. After 2+ years of listening to her conversations, there was no way to avoid it, I gained quite a perspective on her family life. It go to the point that I would use the canned air for dusting keyboards and aim it through the metal gaps it in the cubicle wall. The gap acted like a funnel and she would get a blast of air in the face. She would laugh but I sometimes came back to some sort simple prank at my desk later that night. Like taping my phone to the receiver or stacking my recycled cans all over my desk.

Now I have this new guy that is about 50 feet from me. We have said hi but that is about it. I don’t want to get to know him, not for any fault on his part; I just don’t care to make anymore casual acquaintances at work. I have enough people I have to say hi to and make crappy small talk with. My problem with this guy is the frequency that I get to hear the windows error noise in the background. Now this isn’t a once an hour thing. This guy is hitting the same error 5 times in a row like he is going to force the program to do his bidding by force or he will wear down the programs defenses. And this happens every 5-10 minutes. But what can you expect from a 30-35 year old guy that drives a bright yellow X-Terra with watermelon sized Von Dutch sticker on each of the back side windows.

Oh Billy, do you want some cheese burgers?

The 3rd World is where its at!

Wow a new nightmare for Load. Check out this article about a patient in an Indian hospital getting attacked by ants .

Load’s guide to moving about the populace

Let’s set the scene:

The hallway/sidewalk/approved pedestrian traveling space is 6 people lanes wide. For simplicity sake there are no obstacles i.e. fire hydrants, street vendors, bums, etc. You are walking down the right side in the second person space from the right. A group of 5 people are coming the opposite direction and they are spread out over the 6 lanes of traffic so you are now on a slow motion collision course with the outside edge of their posse. You move over to the edge of the pedestrian thurofare so you are now on the far right. You expect the members of the oncoming group to follow suit (shifting to your left) as a normal rational person would. But, the group ahead of you has not adjusted accordingly and the closest member is still in the lane you are occupying. You have no where else to go because of traffic/wall/etc and impact is 4 steps away: What do you do? What do you do?

A) Step into traffic to let the assholes by?

B) Cut hard left and go the long way around?

C) Hug the wall sideways and brace for impact?

D) Yell “watch the F-CK out” and hope they move and don’t know kickboxing?

E) Scale the wall like some freak science experiment gone bad?

F) Barrel through the group like a violent game of “Red Rover”

G) Or stop dead in your tracks with out turning to let them by.

I prefer G. This is because even though I prefer to not start confrontations, I am still a dick at heart. This option puts the ball in the offending party’s court. Reason being is you are now stopped. Running into a person standing still makes them the offender which is not the case if you are both in motion. If you are both in motion there could be a possible confrontation because there is always a gray area between the individuals opinion of who should have moved over more. After impact a well timed “Excuse you” in a snotty tone is a nice addition if you are fairly certain you can defend yourself if the need arises.

It is pretty funny if you try it. I have obtained various results from person on end stepping behind their acquaintance to full on impact (which one should brace for but not in an obvious manner like having a bent forward knee w/ shoulder down). Smaller persons sometimes bounce off (insert fat joke) which is always great. This technique works great at school, in the mall, on the sidewalk, post office, grocery store, work, playgrounds, you get the idea. Also, you shouldn't ever make eye contact. This only lets them know you did it on purpose.

Remember kids: Treat every hunter as if he were loaded.

Well this is going to be my first day of work after having the last 11 off and I am really looking forward to it…

My armed camping trip was fun (also see hunting). The weather was great, 15 degrees cold in the morning, but great. It snowed quite a bit but it would also melt off some so it never got too thick. We didn’t get anything but everyone saw a lot of elk but unfortunately we didn’t have tags for any that we saw. We were limited to spikes only, meaning that they had to have at least one un-branched antler; a rare find indeed.

I did see a lot of beautiful country that can’t be seen from a state maintained view point or pounded out trail. Much can be said for both of those nature experience options. But, nothing beats that feeling of knowing it is going to be pitch black in 15 minutes and your GPS says that you are 1.42 miles from camp through 12 inches of snow, over fallen trees, through brush, over boulders, up and down hills, carrying a gun/gear and you have already done 6 miles of the same shit everyday for the last 5 days. Life is good in the woods though. I woke up to the suns rays as they just started to move across the snow covered meadow. Then I would get some coffee, food and get my self ready for another day of walking my rifle. I love feeling that I am miles from anywhere, all alone, just me and the woods. Then every once and a while I thing a cougar is stalking me so I check behind me (seriously).

I learned a thing or two this year and I might as well include the other words of wisdom I have gathered over the years sitting in a tent with hissing lanterns while in the midst of a bourbon induced stupor:

1. Shitting in the woods is a delicate process if you care at all about personal hygiene. Without getting into the gritty details there are a few things you need to have at your disposal: baby wipes, paper towels (fingers don’t poke through), and a log sans broken limbs to perch on. Figure out the rest.
2. Do not follow human tracks. You might see something you regret (see above).
3. If you decide to follow a blood trail, make sure that you are the one that shot it. Because Elk can travel many, many, many miles, uphill, before you NEVER catch up with them.
4. When the guy planning the hunt says “After you hit the closed road it pitches off pretty steep”, he is likely referring to an 80 degree slope covered with 1.5-3 feet of snow. Repelling harness and tie off recommended.
5. Always bring too much hooch to hunting camp. There might be a nephew who is thirsty.
6. When cooking one must use a minimum of 2 table spoons of oil, per pan, per item. This includes sausage, bacon and toast.
7. If anyone mentions the words “Death March” during the planning of the following days hunt, do not take it lightly. Pack accordingly and make sure to save camp in your GPS.
8. Empty sand prior to arrival because any sign of weakness is exploited.
9. When told to do something -what ever you do, don’t f#ck it up.

Herbivore my ass.

This is why I go hunting: to protect all of you from deer that will burglarize your homes.

Sabbatical

Blog is on vacation until the 14th. Not that you are reading this anyways.

I am going armed camping for a week and looking for the ever elusive Rocky Mountain Elk a.k.a Wapiti (meaning "white rump" in the Shawnee language) and Cervus canadensis (Erxleben). I will try to get some pictures of the awesome landscapes and post them.