Fire!

Actually this is only a half-hearted rant. I had a brainstorm on Wednesday while at work for what I wanted to shoot for Theme Thursday, of course my camera was at home. I brought it today, but didn’t get a chance to use it. I was going to take the picture at lunch as to not disturb the actual work process, unfortunately about 11:45 the fire alarm went off. I had just got my lunch plate, so I picked it up and headed for the door knowing I’d get an impromptu picnic on the front lawn during the drill. Bad news is it wasn’t a drill. One of the machines in the back of the plant ( a wheelabrator thing that deburrs our parts) had actually caught fire. We had four fire trucks, including the ladder truck drive around the back of the plant, along with 20, count ’em 20, police cars. I think that is the entire contingent of city cops (to be fair all our cops are trained as fireman and vice versa.)

I my haste to grab my lunch, I neglected to grab my new camera. The fire was quickly contained but not before smoke filled most of the plant. No one would be allowed back in until the smoke was cleared. The rest of first shift was canceled and if you had your keys, purses, etc. you could go home, if not have a seat in the shade of the pines and wait. I’m not sure when they let people back in, but by the time I went back at 4:30 to get my stuff, 2nd shift was at work (all except the one department where the machine was) and the place looked clear, but still stunk of smoke.

Tomorrow is a half day at work and Donna and I are off to the Gap for a little fun in the Miata. I will try and get my photo in the morning, but may not post it until Sunday when we get back. Don’t worry, you won’t miss a moment of my exciting life as I plan on analog blogging for transcription on Sunday night.

Hey Little Boy

An old man was sitting on his front porch down in Louisiana watching the sun rise. He sees the neighbor’s kid walk by carrying something big under his arm. He yells out “Hey boy, whatcha got there?”

Boy yells back “Roll of chicken wire.”

Old man says “What you gonna do with that?”

Boy says “Gonna catch some chickens.”

Old man yells “You damn fool, you can’t catch chickens with chicken wire!”

Boy just laughs and keeps walking.

That evening at sunset the boy comes walking by and to the old man’s surprise he is dragging behind him the chicken wire with about 30 chickens caught in it.

Same time next morning the old man is out watching the sun rise and he sees the boy walk by carrying something kind of round in his hand. Old man yells out “Hey boy, whatcha got there?”

Boy yells back “Roll of duck tape.”

Old man says “What you gonna do with that?”

Boy says back “Gonna catch me some ducks.”
Old man yells back, “You damn fool, you can’t catch ducks with duck tape!”

Boy just laughs and keeps walking.

That night around sunset the boy walks by coming home and to the old man’s amazement he is trailing behind him the unrolled roll of duck tape with about 35 ducks caught in it.

Same time next morning the old man sees the boy walking by carrying what looks like a long reed with something fuzzy on the end. Old man says “Hey boy, whatcha got there?”

Boy says “It’s a pussy willow.

Old man says “Wait up…. I’ll get my hat.”

It’s Here

I got a visit from the UPS man this afternoon. Perfect timing too, as we had just pulled into the garage minutes before.

New Digi-Cam.

It’ll take a while before I can digest the instruction manual, as it is about a half an inch thick (to be fair that is four different languages.) One nice thing is that Win2K recognized it as soon as I plugged it in, so I didn’t have to install several hundred megs of Olympus software. Smaller than expected, but this is a good thing for when we go backpacking or I decide to take it along on a bicycle ride.

Praise The Lord, But Get The Hell Out Of My Way

For the last couple of months my wife and I have been meeting a few of our fellow Aiken Bicycle Club members for an early morning ride on Sundays. We have been riding more or less 25 miles by picking a loop from the Club’s inventory of past and present Spring Century rides. It is a small group of 4 to 6 riders of around the same abilities and inclinations so no one is dropped and forgotten about, nor is anyone riding at half speed so as not to get too far ahead. The ride is always fun and a nice work out, plus we are home early enough, around 9:30, so as to still have the whole day left for other things.

Start time is at 7:30 for a couple of reasons. One, it is summer in South Carolina and the heat and humidity make later in the day rides unpleasant at best. And two, traffic is very light at the time of day on weekends. The routes take us on a variety of roads in the lighter populated areas of the county, but in the last 1/2 hour of the ride no matter where we are, car traffic picks up. And these are usually the most rude and impatient drivers. They pass us on two lane roads when there is oncoming traffic and/or as close as possible to us.

The strange thing about these folks is they are all dressed very nicely, obviously on their way to church. I’m a non-attendee of church, so I don’t know why they would endanger our lives, their lives and those of the poor unsuspecting occupants in the other car just to ensure they get a good pew. My recollection of Christian beliefs is not so hazy that I wouldn’t have remembered that being late for church was a sin.

Nothing Important Happened Today

Carl Wormus drinks alone at a bar in Baltimore, MD. He notices a dark-haired woman in a low-cut dress walk in, and he approaches her. They get into a discussion about the ice in his drink. As a water expert, he knows that the government-added Chloramine in the water is actually not as healthy as has been reported. Intrigued, the woman entices him into leaving, and they drive off in his convertible. He slows down at an opening drawbridge, but the woman clamps down on his right leg, forcing his foot on the accelerator. The car flies off the open bridge and plunges into the Potomac River. Deep underwater, Wormus wiggles out of his seatbelt and begins to swim to the surface. The woman is lifeless next to him. Suddenly, the woman opens her eyes, grabs his ankle and pulls him deeper under the water.
Episode 9×01 of the X-Files. It was a two-parter that guest starred Lucy Lawless of Xena: Warrior Princess fame, that featured her as nude as you can get on network television.

This has nothing to do with my day, except that the title of that episode and the title of today’s post are the same.

Purchased Today: $0
Money spent since 03/03/03: $1082.91
Started down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 199

Equal Time?

TBS the Superstation is showing “Terminator” this afternoon. Does this mean that they have to grant equal access time to the other 150 odd (and I do mean odd) candidates? Or did they black out California? Nick at Night will have to stop showing “Different Strokes” re-runs, Comedy Central will have to snip out the Father Guido Sarducci bits in the SNL shows and we probably won’t see the Woody Harrelson flick “The People vs. Larry Flint” for a couple of months either.

Deep Throat is scheduled tonight on X-Files at the Bogarduses.

1/24 Scale

Today the car got a much needed wash and vacuum, plus a shoeshine (some Meguiar’s Endurance Tire Goo.) It needs a waxing, but I didn’t have the time.

This afternoon was a Master’s Miata Club get-together. We hung at a Baskin-Robbins for a while before heading over to the Evans Dinner for chow. After that a few of us headed over to one couple’s house to chat some more. While we were there they said did I want to buy one of the die-cast Miatas that they found over at KB Toys. There were only three left @ $6.99 instead of $9.99 so they bought all 3 of them. John has a red so he kept that one, but he had 2 blue ones left over. Seeing as mine is blue I bought one from him. It is not the exact same blue, but it is still cool. The doors, hood & trunk opens and the steering wheel turns the front wheels. Now all I have to do is make up some 1/24 scale Alley Gator teeth.

After the Miata event we went over to the Augusta Mall as it was close by. The only store that was a possible was Sears, so that was the only place we checked and got the same negative results.

From there we returned to Aiken and hit our Target and Sears and received 2 more noes. In each of these places we shopped I looked at everything they had on display and then asked a sales person if they had the camera in the back, nothing. Including my negative answer from the local camera store when I called them on Friday, I have come up empty handed in 10 places locally.

Hi-ho, hi-ho, to the net we go. Because TheNerds.net is not a dedicated camera store, but a computer store that also sells electronic goodies I hope to avoid a repeat of Will’s digicam online shopping experience.

Purchased Today: $0
Money spent since 03/03/03: $1082.91
Started down went up, went down, up, down, still down.
Top Transitions since 02/02/03: 199