DIRENESS EXPECTED ANYTIME NOW!!!

2:27pm

SNAPSHOTS OF AN EVENT/POSSIBLE NON-LOCAL EVENT UNFOLDING!!!

1:12pm!

Crazy weather

Well, all the earthquakes and surprise electrical storms and brooding, incipient hurricanes sure make for an interesting sky. Hunker down, y'all.

I'm guessing it's over

For years, we have been hearing the caterwauling from both sides about the metro going through Tyson's Corner.  A huge organization materialized to fight against above-ground rail: their rallying cry? "It's Not Over 'til it's Under!"
Driving through Tyson's yesterday would indicate that, oh yes, it's over. In oh so many ways....

Epicenter

Guess this is why Carol seemed to feel it the most. She said her house swayed significantly and she was trying to get out when it stopped.

See, this is what I was worried could happen when I get my spinal shot. I mean, what if the needle was right in there next to your spinal cord when that happened? Hmmm? I actually asked the doctor and he said, "Oh, ho ho, there are never any earthquakes around here."

Things you don't care about...

When you are the fan of a losing team, such as the Washington Nationals, you have to come up with creative ways to dispel the attendant despair.  I have started yet another blog, the Washington Nationals Daily Pic, in which I graphically summarize the previous evening's game. It turns losing into an exercise in creativity. And, really, isn't that what life is all about?

Awwwwww...this is little Kaylee....

She screamed from Denver to about the Baltimore Beltway. Then she fell asleep. Actually, it wasn't so bad.  She was very cute when not screaming. It's just that all she really was capable of or interested in doing was eating, running around, or screaming. She soon got stuffed full of baby snacky food...and it was bumpy, so she couldn't run around...that left her with but one option. Which she exercised with a great and deafening vigor.  Her mom, Ashley, was nice and apologetic but mainly grim, since they were just stopping in Baltimore before hopping on another flight to Florida for another 2.5 hours. Long day for Mom.  Long flight for me.  I kept her entertained for a while, but the task and the length of flight were beyond my abilities.  I needed TW for this one. He can entertain children nonstop for hours on end.

You can tell when you're in Colorado

Into the fiend's embrace

This seemed particularly ominous yesterday.

And so, our Intrepid Golfer takes one last mighty swing...

...cutting through the air with his well-trained blade to end up in the noble pose that has inspired golfers for the many long decades the game has been in existence.

Then he hopped on the road to get mired in THIS for 10 hours....

Horrible drive. Just horrible.  7 hours and fifteen on the way up. Ten hours and a half on the way back. Love you guys!

Packed and ready to roll home

Bye Berkshires!

An accounting

Mom, as I am about to leave here in two days, and you are one of the few who will understand something like this, here are some notes I have gathered driving the same route several times a day back and forth to the Cranwell to work and play.

• It is 7.8 miles to the Cranwell from the hotel, lot to lot
• There are 17 stop lights along the way
• There is one additional flashing yellow light that --as a counter-- I cannot officially count as a stop light
• There are 16 eating establishments of varying styles and price ranges
• There are 3 grocery stores
• There are 78 street lamps - actual street lamps, not to be confused with parking lot lighting adjacent to the roadway
• There are 4 gas station
• There are 2 banks. But intriguingly, there are 4 other financial establishments (Duh - Berkshire Hathaway...)
• Curiously, there are 9 dentists and dental surgeon's offices. All but one in the first half mile from the hotel along 'Dental Row'
• There are two country clubs, if you count the one you end at
• There are three artistic representations of horses along the route
• There are 19 speed limit signs in the southbound direction
• There is a caveman and a pooping gargoyle with light-up eyes
• There are 6 straw people - seven, if you squint and look up the hill
• There are 19 blue houses
• There are between 39 and 47 American flags, depending upon weather, inclination, and wavering patriotism, I suppose

OK, going to play for-real golf today, supposedly. We'll see. Love you guys!

My favorite school movie as a kid

Donald Duck in Mathemagical Land.  Must have seen this 15 times in school over the years; probably every time a math teacher was hung over and didn't feel like trying to teach us brats algebra or something. It's on YouTube for now, but who knows how long Disney will allow that. Taught me everything about billiards I ever knew.  Some bogus material on Golden Ratios in early Greece, but generally very cool at showing how math is in everything in everyday life. I love the Disney narrator, Paul Frees. What a voice.

Happy Birthday, Mom!

I found my phone lodged in the pianist so I promise I'll talk to you later!

Phombo

...which stands for 'Phone Limbo' which is where my phone is now and half the rest of the time. Grrrr.  How is it I can memorize two single-spaced pages of dialogue in 15 minutes but can't remember where my phone is from moment to moment?

And, tragically, I can pretty much guarantee that this is not where I left my phone.  :(

Cliche come to life

So, we are walking back from doing this radio program in downtown Pittsfield, MA, and I am accompanied by Ms. Felicia Curry: paramour of Andy Fahs, my roady pal you've heard me speak of many times; 5' 0" of insane bundled energy; rock-hard from the twice daily workouts, runs, plus the occasional golf and tennis outing; 97 lbs. soaking wet, dressed to the nines at 11:30 on a Thursday morning in a sleepy arty burg where flannel pajamas at the Price Chopper are not necessarily frowned upon. I get to witness an actual cliche.

We are walking through the little Leitchfield-esque (on steroids) main square and come to a street crossing.  The Red Hand is up; the cars have the green; we have to wait.

Except...the cars aren't going.  They just sit there, fronted by an ominous, giant, rednecky, muddy, dirty black pickup truck. Finally, we shrug our shoulders and cross. As we get to the median, one of the most lesbian-looking lesbians I have ever seen in my life --a life in the theatre, mind you-- complete with an actual mullet --I kid you not-- leans out of the driver's side of the pickup and says, "Ma'am, you are so beautiful there is no way I was going to go before you walked in front of me." Then she drove off.

So, I was walking with a girl who actully, really, physically stopped traffic.  Cool. And you can see why.

Frog cupcake from out of the blue!

Next door in our little long-term suites is a lady and her cute, heavily tattooed daughter that happened to see the show one night and noticed the people in the show were the same noisy bunch where they lived. The cute tattooed girl just brought me a midnight cupcake. Yum.  And no, tragically, that is not a metaphor for anything.

And there goes my golf lesson money. Sigh.

Say! Hey? There's a donut on my car!
Hey! Yay! The tire store ain't far!
Boo! Hoo! They can't patch it, man that sucks!
Bye Bye! To a hundred and fifty bucks!

It being a rainy night off last night...

...I decided to finally dare myself to open one of the bottles of Fre I bought ages ago to decorate my (since sold off) kitchen wine rack thingamajig.  You will note the label states this is a 2003 vintage of non-alcoholic wine. I admit I had some doubts...wondering if it would be putrid, if it was actually now an ALCOHOLIC wine...but no. It tasted just fine. I drank half the bottle and am looking forward to finishing off the rest. Who'd a thunk it?

Gross!

OK, day off in beautiful, rainy Pittsfield.  At least the temp has dropped from the high nineties to the high sixties. Excellent.

They got some kind of bugs here. Playing tennis yesterday (gingerly) I felt a shocking burning pain on my left calf. When I finished the point (gotta finish the point) I looked down and something had chawed the hell out of my leg.  Here is a blurry pic of the deep L-shaped furrow whatever it was cut through my leg in about 3 seconds.  Plus there are incidental small point-like wounds all around the same area.  This wound is probably an 1 ⅛ inches long and deep enough to scab over like a cut. I wish to hell I'd seen whatever the heck it was that bit me. Especially since it got my right leg a few minutes later, though not nearly as bad. Some kind of malevolent flying melon-baller, it would seem. 

Red states, blue states, and driving ability

This is a picture taken from the driving range. On a perfectly clear day, on a straight stretch of roadway, on a 40-mph, well-maintained state road, two local drivers were unable to negotiate the complicated "2 lanes go down to 1" highway design.  They ran each other off the road and through the lovely bed of flowers that decorate the entrance to the driving range.

Now, in a red state, one would assume they were both jockeying for position and refused to yield and ran each other off the highway from sheer muleheaded idiocy and lust to be in front.  But this is not a red state. And both of these cars were festooned with Ben -n- Jerry stickers and 'Visualize Whirled Peas' and all the of that other liberal claptrap.  These kinds ran each other off the road because they were nervous nellies who can't drive worth a damn.

Which brings me to my point: although in every other way, I sympathize with the Blue States in general, they are terrible, terrible drivers.  In fact, they are terrified of anything that could hurt them or their dubiously precious offspring.  They drive the way they do because they are scared, all the time. Which, as I get older and grumpier, I start to see is the basis of the Red side scoffing and calling liberals self-centered and self-absorbed. In this small particular, they are correct. Every very liberal friend I have drives like the Grim Reaper is tailing them, nervous eyes darting back and forth, hands twitching on the wheel, braking uphill, regarding every thing around them as a harbinger of death.  They go slow in fast lanes, never mind that they cause people to start changing lanes like demented monkeys behind them to get around, thus making things way more dangerous. They don't care. Eyes locked on the road, fingers frozen into frightened claws on the wheel, mouth set in a rictus of fear, they drive like Victorian women had sex: close your eyes and think of England and you'll get through it.

Driving is dangerous, yes. But it is more dangerous when you are white-knuckling your way making everyone jumpy around you.  Why are people so afraid of dying when there is no chance in the world they are not going to die?  How much fun is your life if you spend it fretting about your death?  I think fretting is a good word here. See...these people who had the accident, they probably could have steered their cars out of each others way- they probably saw the accident coming seconds ahead. But, sadly, all they are really capable of doing is fretting. I'm sure they spent those last few pre-accident seconds worrying about what was about to happen and hoping someone would get them out of it. Even though they are the one holding the steering wheel.

One week up here. I'm trying to follow pickups and avoid Volvos. Cause even though liberals are nicer people, they cannot drive worth a goddam.  Let me follow a guy on the way to a Klan rally or something.  If the whole country one day turns nice, does that mean we'll all have to be whiny, fretful scared, bad-driving, do-nothings? Ah well...the price of progress, I guess.

In honor: every shuttle mission in 8 minutes and 1 second

As you know, I have my reasons for digging the Berkshires

Things I saw on the way up to the Berkshires

I saw traffic jams...

 

I saw the Hudson River....

 

I saw the lovely and blissfully empty Taconic State Parkway in New York.

And...(shudder)...my Nemesis.  I hate that bridge.

Well, I guess not...

Checking Google Maps Street View for that intersection, this is right where I should be.  Approximately where the elephant is pooping out the small child. I can tell you that that CERTAINLY was not there when I was at the intersection earlier today.  So this must be an older picture....