Category Archives: Life

You know, life.

Change in the weather

Life, Work, , ,

wetswing After an incredible run of spectacular late summer and fall weather, my first day of retirement is remarkably dreary. It’s 5 pm and it looks like 10. I hope this isn’t an omen.

So how’s retirement so far? Well it’s wet. It’s been raining almost all day. I did demonstrate to Becky that there were benefits to having a retired spouse. I drove her the one block to the bus stop so she could stay dry while she waited for her bus. I think I might be winning her over to the idea, and I haven’t even done any laundry or cooked any fabulous meals yet. The meals thing is going to have to wait because she’s in the middle of a three day run of going out with her various women friends. To this I usually say, “I wish I had friends,” but that doesn’t work because I had lunch with my buds Steve and Lon today and tonight I’m meeting Mike for dinner and tomorrow, lunch with a musical buddy and former coworker who’s also gone off to entreprenuerate*. Ah the social round.

I did achieve one of my goals today. I got to be one of those guys that sits in coffee shops and surfs the net. Although that almost didn’t happen. The wi-fi was down at the coffee place and I couldn’t get on. I didn’t say anything because I thought I was just being the clueless old guy. Turns out the other three people were similarly unwilling to expose their ignorance.

But the real story of this trip to the coffee shop started yesterday morning as I headed into work. I stopped by for my daily dose of dark roast and ran into the woman who I assumed, correctly, was the manager. “You won’t be seeing much of me anymore, this is my last day at work.” She looked concerned before I reassured her I was retiring. Continue reading Change in the weather →

My daughter is in a mixed relationship.

Family, Life, Sport and Fitness, , , , ,

mixed

I understand your flustration, Sir.

Life, Rants

angrybobThe weather has gone from gorgeous to dark, windy, cold and foreboding. I was having a petty manic day, couldn’t stop smiling over the fact that I’m taking the career leap and won’t have to show up at cubeville after Wednesday. I attributed my high energy level to that but maybe it was just a sugar rush. I came home, the house was cold, I was feeling sneezy and suddenly bone tired, the hypochondriac in me concluded I was coming down with sHw1iNn1e flu. I decided that the thing to do would be contemplate the insides of my eyelids for awhile. The couch beckoned. I was just drifting off when Rebecca came downstairs with her laptop and some questions.
So you might understand why I was feeling a twinge of crabbiness. First question was an easy one, can we survive on the Blockbuster 2 movie plan as opposed to our current 3 movie plan. No brainer! After all we have to cut back now that I’m retired unemployed between jobs exploring entrepreneurial opportunities. The next one is the kind of question I hate the most. “What’s this $12.83 charge on the credit card for “Credit Defense?”
I knew exactly what it was. Wells Fargo calls me about once a week to try to sell me dumb ass enhancements to my accounts and this is one of the faves. I NEVER sign up for it. But apparently some asshole decided to make their quota by signing me up anyway. Now I my ass was really chapped.
Continue reading I understand your flustration, Sir. →

Exploring other opportunities

Life

stogiemanIt’s been awhile since I’ve floated in the blogosphere. I used to be on Xanga, Bkeller49, but I’ve opted to come over to WordPress for the flexibility, and I suppose the bigger audience. I’ve had a site at this address for years, I had big plans for a money making concern based on writing about my myriad hobbies and selling stuff along with it. It was WAY too ambitious and scattered. So I’m resurrecting this site with a couple of intentions.

I want to chronicle the big life change I’m making. Wednesday is my last day working for Dex. I’ve spent the last 18 years working in the Yellow Page industry. The last 14 or so were as a supervisor, which should earn me some kind of “square peg in a round hole” award. More about that later. My sweet wife, Rebecca, won’t let me use the “r” word, and I’m certainly not ready to retire, financially or emotionally. I’m going back to trying to earn a living with my wits and my creative skills. One of the things that I’m going to try to do is web design. So another reason I’ve rekindled this site is to learn WordPess. And finally there’s the faint hope of making a few bucks off my efforts here. After all if Dooce can get rich talking about her constipation, I should be able to make a few bucks with my opposing digestive complaints.

Why “Horizontal Ambition?” Check out the Manifesto.

So wish me luck in my not-retirement as I explore other opportunities! Oh, and those banner images? Not much related to anything, they’re just holding a place until I come up with an appropriately cool and hip graphic.

A small fire in the canyon

ancient history,

It was a small fire that didn’t warrant air support. A construction vehicle had backed into a brush pile along the North Fork of the Coer d Alene, where the canyon wall is steep and close to the river. His exhaust touched off a fire and it burned up the Canyon wall and started spreading out near the top where there was more vegetation. We had what looked like a big collapsable swimming pool that we put on a flat spot up near the limit of how high you can pump water. Then we dragged the pump up. It had a tube welded to it so we could run a pole throught the tube and climb the cliff with two guys supporting it on our shoulders. Then they sent me down to get the gas for the pump. It really wasn’t that dangerous. The ground was mostly rock with only little fires burning around me. As long as it didn’t leak I was perfectly safe. When I got to the top, so tired I had to be pulled the last 5 feet, my crew boss said to me, “As long as you’re resting, go get a hose pack.”
So back down the cliff, strap on 80 pounds of hose and start back up. These packs had one end of the hose hanging out of the bottom and were coiled inside so that you could just hook the hose to the pump and take off with it, stringing it out to where you needed it. Now the boss wanted someone to string it out over a little rise and out into the open area on the other side. At that point I had my 22 year old dander pretty high, and was going to show the boss what a tough guy I was, so I just kept the pack on and took off, laying hose behind me. I was about to die when I came over the top of the rise and then saw, spread out over the hill, the all woman fire crew, digging line. You should have seen me perk up. I pulled that hose across like I was the king of the woods, look out Mr. Grizzly.

I was in such good shape at the end of that summer.

The Rockford Walker

Life

Ralph Kimball died. I didn’t know him. Not many people did, I’ll guess. But if you talk to anyone who drives Fortysecondavenuerockfordroadcountynine the multinamed street that is directly on the other side of the cemetery from me, and mention the homeless guy with the long beard and the fedora, they’d know who you were talking about. He’s been patrolling that road since before we came to the nieghborhood, sometimes pushing a shopping cart, wearing a heavy coat on steamy summer days. I guess he lived in a lean-to over by the Crystal Shopping Center. His sister said in the paper that he had enough money to find a place to live, but he just didn’t want to spend it. He had a few misdemeanors for public intoxication and disorderly conduct, but was known to be harmless. He died of liver disease.

I have a theory about Minnesota winters. People talk about the strong work ethic here and in the Dakotas. I think it’s kind of a Darwinian thing. That sleeping on a park bench thing just doesn’t cut it in January around here. In order to survive you have to make a certain amount of effort, shelter is not optional. And sadly every year people freeze to death in the Twin Cities. But Ralph had been living behind the Golden Wash for at least twenty years. How did he survive? He must have been a resourceful guy. Here’s to ya’, Ralph. Our community is diminished.

Lucia comes home from school today, we’re going to the Gopher Women’s game tonight. I talked to her yesterday, she seems kind of burned out. First semester Freshman year and still making adjustments. Also, one of ther best freind’s Father suddenly is having by-pass surgery. She’s pretty empathetic, so that’s troubling her, I’ll guess. This is probably a good time for some R and R.