The Good,The Bad,and the Ugly

Yeah, that would be the adjectives that would best describe this past week. Since Monday (June30) I must have put over 600 miles on my little red Suzuki car. The week before I got with blogger Robert over at the "Middle Ages" in Iowa. And that Monday we had a little bloggerfest in his hometown if Ames, IA. Which for me is a 220 mile trip one way. I arrived about 12 noon, and we met for lunch at BBQ place called Hickory Park. They have very yummy food, and even at noon on a Monday the place was packed. Robert informed me the crowds are even worse during school on the weekends! After lunch he insisted he pay for our meal even though he didn't have to, again Thank You Robert! Afterwards we hopped in his car and went on a tour of the college town of Ames. There wasn't much we could do outside because that part of Iowa was in two thunderstorm warnings maybe later on a flash flood warning. Because of the weather we just did a lot of drivebys of the ISU campus, city parks or two and were my new friend Robert works you know all the cool sites. :-) Unfortunately Robert's partner Matt wasn't able to join us because of work, I keep forgetting that it was a weekday and some people have to work. Well our time ended all too soon, my friend told me he had to be some where at 5:00 so we wrapped it up. He took me back to my car that we left at the BBQ place. I did bring my camera, but with all the running around town I didn't think to take any photos. And I should have got one of us before we headed our separate ways. Oh well, maybe next time. I told Robert if he's ever in Omaha be sure to give me a shout and we can do a meet up again. I hope he can bring his other half along. The way Robert talk about him, Matt seems like a really nice guy! Well that was the GOOD part of my past week.                                                                 Now for the BAD. A co-worker had asked me a while back if I could drive him to his doctor's appointment Wed.(July2)in Omaha. His brother would do it but couldn't because he was out of town. So I told my friend Dave I would be more than happy to do a buddy a favor. The only problem is Omaha is 85 miles away, and we had to leave at 4:00am. I got up at 3:30am or in military terms 0'dark 30 to get ready and over to Dave's house by 4:00. I just had one small problem, my normal wake-up time wasn't until 5 more hours. I think I did get about 4 hours sleep. Now before I go any further, I've had about a 20 year history with Dave, mostly at work. I've slowly tried to be his friend, but he's very hard person to get to know. He's a very private guy, and doesn't want anybody knowing any of his business, what he does, were he goes. It's only in the past couple of years he's opened more up to me. So I wanted to help him out to prove I could be his friend and trust me. Although if he knew I was blogging about him he'd be p!$$ed. The reason for the trip to the doctor's trip to Omaha, was to repair some problems in his foot. The past 20 years of hiking and biking wore his feet out. This guy would put more miles on his bicycle in a week than I would on my car in a month. I always heard that one should not be friends with an adrenaline junky, which I think my friend is. Any way his operation was for 7:00 and with post-op and recovery be sprung by 11:00. Just one more problem, on the way out the doors of the medical facility one of his incisions started to bleed out. Back to recovery for him, where the PA and nurse re-dress his foot, I'm no expert but it looked like he only bleed out 30-50cc of blood. But better there than in the back of car. By the time we did get out of the hospital it was lunch time. Dave wanted to stop at a Greek place in Omaha called King Kong gyros and burgers. We just had sandwiches both of them were about the size of a 45 RPM record! Not the place to eat unless your very hungry. With all the running around we did, turning his pain med prescriptions in, filling my car with gas (6.5 gal x $3.50), picking up meds. I got him home around 4:30pm, by then the nerve block was starting to wear off. Since then my poor friend has been laid up on the floor with his foot up in pain. :-(  That was the bad part.                     Now for the UGLY; While my friend and co-worker was getting his foot worked on, on, I did  some looking online the week prior and found the address of a guy I met online about 5 years ago. Mike and I  chatted for a little, talked on the phone.  Finally had a chance to meet for lunch one Saturday a few days before Thanksgiving. I thought we hit it off good. That was in the winter of 2009/10, very cold and 8-12 inches of snow about every 2 weeks. Well in Aug.-Sept. 2011 things started to get a little weird. I would call no answer, email, nothing. One time I went to were he worked, he acted strange and had a strange look in his eyes. I've seen that look before, like he was saying " your a good guy....but" A week later I sent him an email his reply was I don't want see or talk to you any more good-bye.  I went to Mike's house Wednesday morning (July2) about 8:00am. When he first saw me I think his reaction was one of shock, I don't think he wasn't happy to see me. He asked how did you find were he lived? I asked if I could come in? Of course he said NO! I have to get ready for work. I told him sorry to bother him, have a nice day. All in all the conversation lasted about 30 seconds. I at least hoped we could talk for 5 mins or so. His birthday was this past weekend so I wanted to wish him Happy birthday. I knocked on his door 3 more times after he shut it in my face. So I left him a note on the windshield of his car. "Sorry to bother you. Don't worry I won't come around again. Have a nice life. RAH" It went down about like I thought. Here is a pic my friend Mike. One of the last times we went out to eat.

Time for am update

My Computer for some time now has told me it's time to update my op system. Things won't work correctly, we will not support, etc. etc. So to day I'm taking my good ol' Dell to my computer guru to install much needed improvements. I should just go out and buy a new computer. Goodness knows with all the overtime I've been working (50 hours +) I can afford it! I suppose I could still use my tablet for post, but it's kind of klunky to use for blogger. I my be back online in a day or two.

Ready For A Weekend!

As some of you know, I was told I'm working 10 hours day for this month and maybe next month also. So I need a weekend to decompress! So after a night of working late. I got up early to do house chores. Like laundry, replace the storm doors, both front and back and went to an auction. I didn't buy much, nothing really there I wanted. If any one was wondering if you heard about the wicked storms that passed thru eastern NE last Tuesday. Not to worry, we made it out in one piece. No hail or tornadoes,just 2.5 to 3 inches of rain and 50+ MPH wind. People to the north and eastof me not so lucky. Towns 60mi. east of me received golf ball to tennis ball size hail. I heard a car lot with 4500 cars windows broken out to the tune of $15,000,000. I'm thinking of going into the window screen business. Anyway work is driving me crazy, good news is I don't have very far to go! I just leave you with this final thought, earlier I was reading Dr Spo's blog And I found a quote for him and everyone else. Another psych funny.

A Pic A Month in May?

I know that a lot of bloggers are doing a-pic-a-day-in-May. It seems all I can do in one picture in May. seeing how my last blog post was 3 almost 4 weeks ago. I guess the best I can describe is I've been in a blue funk for the past 6-7 weeks. As Ron (Retired in Delaware) would say my black dog is back. I've just a lack of energy and not really interested in doing anything. Work has been more of a downer these past few weeks. I've been given what we used to call in the military a s#!t detail, and it's going to be mine for the next 14 months at least. The powers that be won't hire and train someone else to do it, and since I used to have that position ( 10 years ago) it's mine again. I would really like to go back to school and train for something better. but with working 10 hour days M-F and 6 hours on Sat. It doesn't leave much time for classes, studying and more importantly sleep. I'm thinking time management will have to be my main goal. But I'm just now starting to adjust my mental state and things are turning around. A friend and I from work have a out of town expectation Saturday to the big city of Lexington,NE, it's a Ham radio flea market, and it's being held at the military museum. Maybe if I ask real nice they will let me drive their M-715 jeep pick-up truck. When I was overseas 30 years ago I drove one, at the time I hated it. The vehicle has no power steering, no power brakes, driving the thing was physically and mentally exhausting. So tomorrow should be fun. I've got lots to say just need to get around to it. Also for my last pic in May, I found a couple of comics I thought were funny. Could someone give Dr. Spo a heads up? I think they're just up his alley if he hasn't seen them. More when I return! Randy.

Sunday Selfie



Randy Before And After



I know this is not a new idea and it's not original coming from me. But it's my blog's Sunday selfie. The only difference is I have a photo of a before and after. The two selfie pic are week apart, before Easter and the Monday following. I went and did a clear cut of the goatee beard and got another buzz cut. I always get a buzz about every 6-8 weeks. I always let the stache grow back with maybe an occasional trim. Which one looks best ( that's a loaded question), Randy on the left or on the right?

My Guardian Angel

Last week or at least before the end of April, I wanted to do an end of April post. I know I haven't been paying must attention to my blog. The last post was about a month ago. Right after I got back for Richmond/Lewes, I went back to work and lots of overtime. And I guess I was a little bummed/down about have to leave all my new friends I met on the east coast. Many things have happened that I could blog about, and I will just in reverse order of them occurring. So this is the first blog post in May for me. Now with that rant out of the way, why the title my Guardian Angel? Well I'll tell ya, ever since the weather has started getting warmer I've been going out in the mornings for 2-3 mile walks. I'll mix it up a bit and walk west. Or north and then west along Hwy 30 that runs east and west thru town. Friday morning I had to go to the bank and across the highway to Walgreens. I was at the end of the crosswalk waiting for the light to turn green for me to cross. There also was a car waiting to turn right, I would cross her path. And she was waiting for the traffic to clear so she could go. I looked right at the driver and was sure she knew I was there and what I intended to do. The traffic light DID turn green for me and started into the cross walk. Then a pick-up truck pulling a trailer full of metel scrap blew thru the red light with in feet in front of me, didn't even slow down! I guess he didn't think that red light applied to him, I don't think he even bothered to look for me standing there! That's when I think some force, my Guardian Angel grabbed my shirt collar to keep me from stepping in front of a$$hole's truck. Heaven forbid I should slow him down and waste his valuable time. I don't know, maybe I saved that young lady waiting to turn into traffic headache of getting into a fender bender with mister leadfoot. Anyway do Guardian Angels exist? I'm sure I have one maybe two, I've been helped out several times over the past of my nearly 55 years. There's is no scientfic evidence of course, some one could say that it just wasn't my time yet. I live another day to see one more sunset. So what do you think blogger buddies? The next post may be one to ponder, but not quite so heavy.

Blogger Haul

Well earlier this week I received a care package from Jay in VA. Well not really a care package just a box of all the stuff I could not fit in my luggage. The USPS must be really slow, because Jay said he mailed it on 3-26 and I got tue or wed. this past week. Everthing made it OK. The Inn @ Canal SQ. robe I purchased upon checking out my bottle of yummy real maple syrup that Ron's friend Pat brought down from Canada for all us bloggers, THANK YOU Pat! A small jar of Slugmama's homemade relish, again yummy! My beer glass from Burley Oak in Berlin,MD And let's not forget my brite red Cha Cha heels. I would have tried them for the photo but my feet are too big or the shoes are too small. I'm afraid I don't do heels anyway. Heres the picture of me with all my goodies.