As 2007 Closes...

Hope everyone had a pleasant holiday season.

We celebrated Christmas Eve Eve at our house with the children and their significant others. Christmas Eve we migrated across the Cascades to our home town in Eastern Washington and spend the evening at my brother’s house with his family, our mom and countless doggies. Christmas Day was spent with Annette’s folks and siblings. One relative (yeah, that guy) was out of town and couldn’t attend the festivities, and so a pleasant time was had by all.

Christmas night we got together with my old guitar playing buddy and his wife who we hadn’t seen since the turn of the century. We’ve been friends since kindergarten, and so it was great to catch up again. He’s a good story teller and is just getting into blogging. I gave him a link on the sidebar and am now waiting for a first post.

We returned home on the day after Christmas as Mother Nature decided to dump a couple feet of snow on the Cascades. One icy fishtail on the first pass and heavy traffic on the second pass, but we got across before the chain signs went up. Took an extra hour to get across, but at least the trip wasn’t boring.

Tomorrow we’ll be celebrating the New Year with friends we traditionally get together with each year at this time. Then everything goes back to normal on Wednesday. Glad it’s a short week.

Looking back at the year 2007, it was a particularly good one for us. The UK and Alaskan trips were the highlights. We’re thankful for our families and friends and wish everyone the best.

I’d like to wish a Happy New Year to all my blogger friends around the world. I’ve enjoyed your posts over the past year. Hope I’ve provided a chuckle or two with mine, or at least a “well, that’s interesting”.

Here’s to a great 2008!

Weird and Quirky Tag

A couple months ago I received a tag from Lavs requesting that I list several quirky things about myself. I’ve noticed another tag making the rounds that requires the persons being tagged to list several weird things about themselves. I’m making the assumption that quirky and weird are pretty much the same thing. Seeing myself as completely normal and unable to come up with a list, I turned to Annette for advice. Much to my surprise, she came up with a list immediately.

Sleep: When it’s time to sleep, I simply lay down and am out in about five seconds. On the flip side, I always beat the alarm clock by five minutes. If my schedule changes and I set the alarm for a new time, it doesn’t matter. I’ll still beat it by five minutes. My alarm clock wakeup song is Mhare Hiwda Mein Naache Mor from the movie Hum Saath Saath Hain. I often let it play all the way through just because I like it. (Not too weird, is it?)

Trivia: My head is totally filled with useless trivia and I have no idea where much of it came from. I once played a game of Trivial Pursuit against a team of three, and won, six pies to one. When not running the categories on Jeopardy, I often do crossword puzzles with Annette. In the last puzzle, I somehow knew what a demi-plie was and she hasn’t let me live it down yet. (Guess I better grab my shotgun, hop in the Jeep, go kill something and then be back in time for the big game and a few beers.)

Home Safety: When it comes to home safety, particularly fire and theft, I get a tad obsessive-compulsive about it. Before we go anywhere I always give the house a once over. OK, actually a twice over. Many times we leave the house and end up circling back to see if the door was properly locked and the coffee pot was unplugged. (They always are.)

Food: I will pretty much try anything and everything. I am always on the lookout for new and tasty critters. I was very excited to find canned Musk Ox during the Alaskan trip. To me, the food on the Discovery Channel always looks good. I would love to try roasted grubs. I hear they’re nutty. If given a chance to have roasted tarantulas in the Amazon jungle, hey, I’m there!

Nipples: One extra, but rather subtle. And yes, the legend is true.

Vintage?

A few years back… well OK… a couple of decades or so ago; I bought a brand new 1979 Fender American Stratocaster. The “Strat” is a nice little guitar; transparent red, light weight, comfortable contoured body and easy to play. It served me well until the LP came along.

While killing time last evening, I checked eBay and did some Google searches for 1979 American Strats just to see what they were going for and what guitar players thought of them.

To my dismay, these instruments were all described as “vintage”.

What? A guitar that I bought new is now a “vintage instrument”?

So now I am a vintage guitar player. I suppose that sentence can be read two ways.


The above picture was put together by The Princess a few years ago, probably around the end of the Seattle Grunge era (flannel anyone?). Nirvana, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden…good stuff. (Sorry, Pearl Jam is way overrated).

MeMe and the Blahs

My immune system is generally pretty good and so I only get sick every couple of years. Apparently two years have passed. It's just a basic cold, but it does tend to cloud my mind a bit. So without any brilliant blog ideas, I'll pick up on Dave's post who had picked up on Lisa's post.

What have I done.

Note: Things actually done are in boldface. Everything in parenthesis are comments by me.

01. Bought everyone in the bar a drink
02. Swam with wild dolphins
03. Climbed a mountain
04. Taken a Ferrari for a test drive
05. Been inside the Great Pyramid
06. Held a tarantula
07. Taken a candlelit bath with someone
08. Said “I love you” and meant it
09. Hugged a tree
10. Bungee jumped
11. Visited Paris
12. Watched a lightning storm at sea
13. Stayed up all night long and saw the sun rise
14. Seen the Northern Lights
15. Gone to a huge sports game
16. Walked the stairs to the top of the leaning Tower of Pisa
17. Grown and eaten your own vegetables
18. Touched an iceberg (A glacier is close)
19. Slept under the stars
20. Changed a baby’s diaper
21. Taken a trip in a hot air balloon
22. Watched a meteor shower
23. Gotten drunk on champagne
24. Given more than you can afford to charity
25. Looked up at the night sky through a telescope
26. Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment
27. Had a food fight
28. Bet on a winning horse (Only losing horses)
29. Asked out a stranger
30. Had a snowball fight
31. Screamed as loudly as you possibly can (Morning commute)
32. Held a lamb (Only legs and racks)
33. Seen a total eclipse (Solar and lunar)
34. Ridden a roller coaster
35. Hit a home run
36. Danced like a fool and didn’t care who was looking
37. Adopted an accent for an entire day
38. Actually felt happy about your life, even for just a moment
39. Had two hard drives for your computer (No, but two floppies on a IIe)
40. Visited all 50 states (40 down 10 to go)
41. Taken care of someone who was drunk (And vice versa)
42. Had amazing friends (Good but not amazing)
43. Danced with a stranger in a foreign country
44. Watched whales
45. Stolen a sign
46. Backpacked in Europe
47. Taken a road-trip
48. Gone rock climbing
49. Midnight walk on the beach
50. Gone sky diving (And leave a perfectly good airplane?)
51. Visited Ireland
52. Been heartbroken longer than you were actually in love
53. In a restaurant, sat at a stranger’s table and had a meal with them
54. Visited Japan
55. Milked a cow
56. Alphabetized your CDs
57. Pretended to be a superhero
58. Sung karaoke (Nobody wants to hear that)
59. Lounged around in bed all day
60. Played touch football
61. Gone scuba diving (Only snorkeling)
62. Kissed in the rain
63. Played in the mud
64. Played in the rain
65. Gone to a drive-in theater
66. Visited the Great Wall of China
67. Started a business
68. Fallen in love and not had your heart broken
69. Toured ancient sites
70. Taken a martial arts class
71. Played D&D for more than 6 hours straight
72. Gotten married
73. Been in a movie
74. Crashed a party
75. Gotten divorced
76. Gone without food for 5 days
77. Made cookies from scratch
78. Won first prize in a costume contest
79. Ridden a gondola in Venice
80. Gotten a tattoo
81. Rafted the Snake River (Only power-boated)
82. Been on television news programs as an “expert”
83. Gotten flowers for no reason (Only for reasons)
84. Performed on stage
85. Been to Las Vegas
86. Recorded music
87. Eaten shark
88. Kissed on the first date
89. Gone to Thailand
90. Bought a house
91. Been in a combat zone (Someone had to protect the Med)
92. Buried one/both of your parents
93. Been on a cruise ship (Only aircraft carriers)
94. Spoken more than one language fluently
95. Performed in Rocky Horror
96. Raised children
97. Followed your favorite band/singer on tour
98. Passed out cold
99. Taken an exotic bicycle tour in a foreign country
100. Picked up and moved to another city to just start over
101. Walked the Golden Gate Bridge (Just to the first tower)
102. Sang loudly in the car, and didn’t stop when you knew someone was looking
103. Had plastic surgery
104. Survived an accident that you shouldn’t have survived
105. Wrote articles for a large publication
106. Lost over 100 pounds (I never bet on cricket)
107. Held someone while they were having a flashback
108. Piloted an airplane
109. Touched a stingray
110. Broken someone’s heart
111. Helped an animal give birth
112. Won money on a T.V. game show
113. Broken a bone
114. Gone on an African photo safari
115. Had a facial part pierced other than your ears
116. Fired a rifle, shotgun, and pistol (also light machine gun)
117. Eaten mushrooms that were gathered in the wild
118. Ridden a horse
119. Had major surgery
120. Had a snake as a pet
121. Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon
122. Slept for more than 30 hours over the course of 48 hours
123. Visited more foreign countries than U.S. states
124. Visited all 7 continents (4 down 3 to go)
125. Taken a canoe trip that lasted more than 2 days
126. Eaten kangaroo meat
127. Eaten sushi
128. Had your picture in the newspaper
129. Changed someone’s mind about something you care deeply about
130. Gone back to school
131. Parasailed
132. Touched a cockroach
133. Eaten fried green tomatoes
134. Read The Iliad - and the Odyssey
135. Selected one “important” author who you missed in school, and read
136. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
137. Skipped all your school reunions
138. Communicated with someone without sharing a common spoken language
139. Been elected to public office
140. Written your own computer language (Too geeky even for me)
141. Thought to yourself that you’re living your dream
142. Had to put someone you love into hospice care
143. Built your own PC from parts (Does a Sinclair Kit count?)
144. Sold your own artwork to someone who didn’t know you
145. Had a booth at a street fair
146. Dyed your hair (No, it changed color on it's own)
147. Been a DJ
148. Shaved your head
149. Caused a car accident
150. Saved someone’s life

Note to Lavs: In case you happen to read this, I still owe you a tag response.