That’s Not Fair

That?s Not FairI guess business was good last year. First they announced we will be adding profit sharing to our benefit roster, then yesterday they passed out free golf umbrellas to everyone and today we had a company Fun Day. They supplied the hamburgers, hot dogs (with all the fixings), chips and never ending fountain drinks and set up tables and chairs on the front lawn. They also gave away about 70 door prizes. Donna won a 8′ x 11′ dining canopy. And for desert they gave out Megapasses, admission plus all the rides you want, to the Western Carolina State Fair that is right across the street.

Donna and I were the only ones to actually walk over. It may have been right across the street, but you had to walk all the way to the other side to get to the entrance (probably a 1/2 mile.) We didn’t ride any rides, we watched other people ride. We didn’t partake in any of the games of “chance” either. We did walk around the whole place twice, we looked at all the displays and contest entries and came home. Thanks ASCO.

Oh, it happened again. Two days in a row now. On one of the circuits as we passed by the dunk the Bozo tank, I heard some one shout, “Hey old man!” When I looked over, the clown laughed and said, “Yeah you.” I kept on walking…

Rocket Man

Somewhere here before, I kiddingly mentioned that I should root for the Houston Astros instead of the FRS. A search can’t locate it, so that means one of two things, it happened in 2004 and I thought it wasn’t worth saving or it happened prior to 2004 and it is still in the archives. Well starting tonight I guess I will root for them, at least for the next 4 to 7 games. Houston and the Chicago White Sox will play in the 2005 World Series and I hope my cheering for the Astros doesn’t hurt them. 🙂

I gave a couple of reasons why I should switch allegiances, one of which that the Astros current uniform is a pretty good match for the Emperor’s color, so I would be stylin’ and profilin’. The second was tonight’s Houston starting pitcher, Roger Clemens, AKA Rocket. Donna and I were lucky enough to see the young 20-something Clemens pitch the New Britain Red Sox to the Eastern League Championship in 1985. Ever since I have almost always liked the guy (there was that one stint of pitching for the Yankees.)

Go ‘Stros!

Seems A Long Time Ago…

2004. Now you can read almost all about it. When I first started with the text file of that year it was over 900k. By the time I was done it was half that. Quite a bit of that was due to eliminating the photo meme entries. I was doing 3 a week. Then I ditched a bunch of how’s the whether posts and similar filler.

Once I imported that file my list of monthly archives doubled in length. Not really happy with that development (especially if I do the previous 2 years too) I went looking for a solution. Like most things blog wise, if you can imagine it, someone else has already created a plug-in for it. Thanks Rob.

Now I just need to figure how to display the whole months posts on the archive page like MT used to do. Then I will work on getting them to display from first to last, which seems better suited to archives, rather than starting at the end of the month.

I wonder it categories should do that too? Or should they be like the front page and display from most recent to oldest? No rest for the weary…

OW! That Hurt

Finishing up my thrice-weekly rollerblading tonight, as I passed by a minivan parked in a driveway not to far from home, a five or 6 year old kid standing on the passenger seat called out as I passed, “Old man skating!”

Ow, that hurt. And to make sure he had his parents attention, he said it again, only louder this time, “OLD MAN SKATING!”

Maybe I ought to look into some of this stuff?

Trash Talking

Trash TalkingI’m only halfway through pruning 2004’s entries. There is a lot of trash entries in there. I’d like to maybe not write so many inane posts, forcing one, even when there is nothing to write about, but I’m afraid if I don’t write something every night, the “good” will never materialize. FYI, this is exactly the kind of post I am deleting…

Back Office Biz

I’ve started to go back over my off-line archives and weed out the multiple posting of the same topics. I’m also taking out any of the photo related entries now that I’ve put them all in galleries. All of this was caused by having multiple blogs for multiple purposes and later combining them into one big ol’ blog-o-rama. I’m tossing out some of the lame entries as well, those that were posted just for the sake of posting and have no redeeming value. This is not to say that I can eliminate everything that has no value, if I did, there wouldn’t be anything here (and right about now there are some of you thinking that wouldn’t be such a great loss.) This is definitely slow going, I worked at it for a couple of hours on and off and only managed to get through a little less than two month’s worth. there are 3 years worth to do total.

I Vant Your Blood

I Vant Your BloodOne of our routes to Augusta has an old abandoned industrial looking building on it. I always thought it would be a nice backdrop for a Miata photograph, but it is always locked up. But a few times recently the gate has been open, so it is must be used for something. Unfortunately those times we have been on a mission and haven’t had the time to stop.

Last Saturday, Miata photographs were my mission and the gate was unlocked. I drove in and parked near a loading dock. There was a sign that said, “Please check in at office.”, but with its patinaed look I had no idea whether it was current or a holdover from when this place was actually in use. As I turned the corner I noticed a trailer with a door open so I called inside, “Hello.” A fellow in coveralls appeared and said hello right back. I asked him what was this place and he told me it is used as a training facility for heavy equipment operators. (This explains the half dozen old bulldozers, ranging in size from big to real big, parked there (not visible from the road.) It is open on every other Friday and Saturday, but today there was classroom training at a different location because they were installing new classrooms at this site. The rusty buildings aren’t used anymore, but they were a part of a Huber Clay Co. kaolin mine processing plant. I asked if he minded if I parked my car around the other side of the building and took a few pictures. He said no, so off I went.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/05: 335