WORST - Dog - Haircut - EVER!!!!

We are NEVER going back to that particular PetsMart (281 & Bitters, San Antonio) ever Again! The groomer was behind schedule, he was rude to the customers, and instead of the "bath/#2 grooming/nail clip" requested, we got a "flea dip/#3 grooming/no nail trim" doggie.

Really, I don't think Samantha's ever been so embarrassed by a tail Pom-pom before in my life. (And for those noting that a lot of my pictures of Samantha seem to involve her in . . . "elimination poses", it's because that's the only time she stays still long enough to take a picture.)



Otis is terrified we'll take him to that same groomer, and hides in terror. (He's not a very bright cat, and doesn't realize we can see through windows.)

~~JD~~

More Great Moment (s) in Male Nursing

I used to be a feminist. Really!

When i saw a sophomore at Indiana University in the fall of 1977, I went to a Student Activities fair in the I.U. Fieldhouse, which was full of various student organizations, official and unofficial, vying for the time and donations of new students at IU. The N.O.W. (National Organization of Women -- remember when they were relevant?) booth had a very pretty brunette girl named Kelly (I think) who was both very charming and very good at signing up people left and right. For about $20.00 a year (I paid cash out of my pocket) you became a member of the N.O.W., complete with a monthly magazine and membership card.

Certainly seemed like a worthy cause at the time. I was (at the time, and still am today) in favor of equal pay for equal work, whether it's religious, racial, or gender differences.

So when I find women in Nursing who seem to have problems with a man in "their field," it always gives me pause.

A sudden, sharp, bug-eyed pause. Think a Bugs Bunny reaction shot type pause.

That's the look I usually give a (female) nurse when they say something to me like "You have no place here." (That particular one's been said to me three different times.) When my ex-boss asked me if I was having a sex change operation garnered a similar look.

One of the places I worked recently was very happy to see 6-foot, 200 pound little old me come a-walkin' in the door. The comment "Oh Good -- another strong back" is something I hear frequently, and I heard it that night.

Why? My size? I'm not a damned crane -- I'm a nurse. I asked about that once -- she answered, "well, men are better lifters than women."

Lift your own damned patients, lady. Until they stamp 'Caterpillar" on my butt, I'm a nurse.

The same place was also glad to see me because they had fired one of their Respiratory Techs 10 years ago for siphoning pain medications out of the patient's IV bags. he had retaliated by driving by the facility later that night and spraying the building with gunfire.

Nice guy, really.

He had just been released that month from doing 10 years in prison for the drive-by, and the staff was worried he might come back again. "You'll be good to have around in case of a 'Code White'," they noted.

A "Code White" is code for a Violence Situation. So, what, I'm the bouncer now?

One of the first places I worked in San Antonio (which has since changed management and been sold -- imagine that!) promised me a $2000.00 bonus after the first 90 days. This sounded pretty good to me, since we had no savings to speak of when we moved here. The bankruptcy followed by the move had pretty much cleaned us out.

They were also chronically short-handed and anticipating an inspection from JCAHO and the state of Texas imminently. I took this as my cue to impress, and worked long extra hours to make much-needed overtime and show the boss I wasn't afraid to work hard and get my hands dirty. My supervisor was grateful for the help and my industry, and told me not to worry about the overtime -- she would "square things with the Administrator."

Ninety days later (and the day after the inspectors left) the Administrator told me that I wouldn't be paid the Bonus as promised because I "had racked up too much overtime." When i questioned her on this, her response was, "Well, isn't this just like a man!"

What in the world my gender had to do with their defrauding an employee -- I've never made that connection, really. That's the only place I've ever worked where I didn't give two weeks notice and just walked out. Felt very satisfying, really.

Maybe I'm just getting cranky in my old age, I dunno. The kicker happened to me last weekend at another of the facilities I work at. The supervisor was chastising me for something I didn't do -- which no one had bothered to tell me about; but I digress. The supervisor looked me square in the eye and said, "Dumbass Agency Nurse."

When I didn't react, she asked if I had heard her -- then repeated it for effect.

The nurse I was working with grinned and said, "No -- Dumbass Male agency Nurse!" She and the Supervisor thought this was uproariously funny, and laughed their heads off at the alleged joke.

I'm beginning to see a common thread in all these facilities I work at -- they treat their employees like crap. This explains why they're chronically short of staff.

I may be a Dumbass, but that facility is now short another nurse, aren't they?

~~JD~~

HEY! That's my Niece!

Grandchild carries on Valpo parks legacy

June 20, 2007
By James D. Wolf Jr. Post-Tribune correspondent

VALPARAISO -- Kaitlyn Cook's preparation for her summer job with the Department of Parks and Recreation began early.



Her grandparents were Marilyn and Ordell Gertsmeier, a driving force for the parks from the 1980s on.

"I have memories of going to the park boards' meetings early in the morning," before grandma took her to school, she said.

When Foundation Meadows Park began, "I remember her coming home and talking about 'What should we name it?' " Cook said. And her first-grade handprints are still part of Valplayso.

"It was definitely natural to come back to the parks (department) and work for it and be part of it," said Cook, who is majoring in nursing at Cedarville University in Ohio.

Cook's major follows a family sense of service, like her grandparents, who worked for the Boys & Girls Clubs before the parks.



Former Parks Director John Seibert met Cook's grandparents in 1980 before he became director in 1985. Ordell became a charter member of the park foundation in 1989, and Marilyn took his place when he died.

"Anything that happened between 1990 and 2001, she was in the middle of," Seibert said.

When the community-built Valplayso Park went up, Gertsmeier gathered many of the volunteers and came every day.

She also worked for Fairgrounds Park, Lakewood Links and Creekside Golf course, he said.

The parks recognized the Gertsmeiers' contributions by naming the footbridge in Rogers-Lakewood Park after Ordell in 1996 and adding Marilyn in 2005.

Beyond her drive, Seibert recalls Gertsmeier's graciousness, writing notes of thanks, encouragement or advice.

"Things that lot of people would like to say we do, she did," Seibert said.

Parks Director Steve Doniger recalls Gertsmeier as honest and a good sounding board for ideas.

"If Marilyn said you need to do something for the parks, you did it. She was so passionate and dedicated," Parks Marketing Coordinator Kelly Deal said.



Deal saw that in Cook before she knew who she was.

"From the second I met her, I thought she would be good for the job," Deal said.

Cook, who's finished freshman year, probably won't stay with the parks, especially with ROTC obligations after graduation.

But for summers, she's working by what grandma built.

(You can click on the title of this post for the link to the original Post-Tribune article.)

~~JD~~

Reclaiming the Past in Pictures

It's been ten days since I posted last, but I've been pretty busy.

Ariane & I were going through the storage shed last weekend looking for paperwork she needed for her acceptance appointment to Nursing school (She had the appointment today; we'll know more later.) In the process of digging through every- single- box- in- the- place, we found pictures.



LOTS of pictures. I'm something of a shutterbug and have been since I discovered my mom's first Brownie camera back in the 70's, so I've got a LOT of accumulated photos. I had a pretty nice Nikon camera while I was in the Army, which I still miss -- and have a nifty little digital built into my Palm Pilot right now which is pretty useful, too.



Ariane's concern is that a lot of these older photos are starting to degrade, and wondered aloud how we could preserve them. And, of course, here I was with the scanner she gave me for Christmas two years ago and a very nice laptop with 50 gigs of memory. (I think she baited me into a trap, actually.)






(So my revenge is to post pictures of Ariane in her underpants. Serves her right.) I suggested scanning them into digital versions as a method of sending them to family overseas, but it was clear pretty quickly that we had grossly underestimated the amount of photos we've got squirreled away. I've been on this nonstop for pretty much ten days and I'm just finishing the second Banker's box full of photos tonight.

Two down, 12 to go.



One of the great ideas I had to motivate me to finish the scanning was that we would be able to share these photos with the rest of the family. Originally I envisioned putting the pictures on a couple of CDs and giving them as Christmas gifts. As the size of the project became apparent, I started thinking about Flash drives. however, it's becoming apparent portable hard drives may be the answer -- just for me to store all these photos. As of yesterday afternoon my own 50 gig Hard Drive is now 87% full. (When I started 10 days ago, it was 23% full.)



Anybody know where I can get a deal on portable hard drives?



This picture of my cousin Jon is a perfect example. I doubt I'll be able to find the original negative (even assuming it's undamaged); but the print suffered water damage during the flood at our house in Missouri in 1993. While it's still viewable, I'd never be able to get a usable print for reproduction purposes; and as soon as I scanned this and tried to clean up the photo for a second scan, it disintegrated in my hands. (Still, I'm glad we were able to preserve the picture.)



So, if my posting is a little spotty, I'm not trapped behind the East German border; I'm probably bent over the scanner trying to sort my way through a couple of thousand family photos. I'll post a few of the more interesting ones from time to time. You can save your own copies by right clicking on the photos here and selecting "Save Picture As". (I recommend saving them to either "My Pictures" or your Desktop so you can find them again.)



Enjoy.

~~JD~~

Paradigm Change vs. Releasing Your Inner Grouch

Another change to my paradigm; how I think about myself and my life.

When I found out Julian was (possibly) going to China, I started picking up some temp work from a local Nursing Temp agency. The Nursing market in San Antonio is huge and rapidly expanding, so there is always a need for part-time help. Plus the gross incompetence that traditionally passes for "Management" in Nursing exacerbates this problem, of course. Physicians fighting the Business Managers, demanding royalty treatment from Nursing personnel, whilst Nursing Managers promote Political Correctness with a heapin' helping of pseudo-feminist diatribe politics for good measure.

Just my opinion there, of course.

So when the Temp Agency offered me $3.00 an hour more per hour (which is still $5.00-6.00/hour more than I usually make) -- plus a bonus incentive of an additional $4.00/hour for last-minute calls, I was pretty much hooked. Pulling a couple of extra shifts got me the $700.00 I needed for Julian's trip very quickly.

So when the place i was working for started giving me static about having a second job (as they usually do), it wasn't a hard choice to make. When you can work three days a week and make what you used to make working five days it's really no contest. Plus the versatility of picking and choosing your work schedule makes it ideal for when i start Nursing Practicals for my RN school later this year.

Of course there are certain drawbacks to working for an Agency as well. Sometimes the work is not the "desirable" work of Day Shift, 9 to 5 stuff. It's frequently Evenings or Night Shifts, which is okay by me as long as it pays this well. You may not be able to work 7 days a week if you want -- most places need help on weekends. So you have to "strike while the iron is hot" and pick up what you can when you can -- which is why I just worked 8 days in a row.

I thought to myself yesterday in the office as I was waiting for them to cut my paycheck, "When did I become this flexible? When did I stop being such a damned Grouch? I kind of miss my inner Grouch, really. No excuses to hide behind anymore, are there?

The capper, of course, is that I get the chance to work in many different environments and see lots of different facilities and How-they-do-it-Here. It allows me to practice skills that have atrophied or are almost forgotten from years of atrophy.

Damned if I'm not on the path to becoming Super-Nurse. That's a good thing.

~~JD~~

It's OFF!!!; Part II

Seems to be a theme here lately . . .

Apparently got a detail incorrect when I reported this a few days ago. Julian was not, in fact, the First Runner Up for the China Trip. He was, in fact, one of the Top Three, which is still pretty impressive in and of itself.

So when one of the kids for the China trip dropped out, they notified the Top Three Runners-up to see if any of them wanted to go -- and, of course, one of the kids above Julian jumped at the chance, just like we did.

So, Julian is not going to China . . . this year. It does put him in prime position to go next year, of course -- just not right now.

Durn it.

~~JD~~

More News about Julian

It's hard to keep up with this kid!

You may recall that I mentioned Julian was taking Chinese classes "just for fun" on Sunday afternoons. I don't remember if I mentioned it was a cute girl that talked Julian into the classes, although he didn't need a lot of convincing.

You may also recall that he was in a competition with other class leaders for a trip to China this summer sponsored by The Asia Society. He didn't win, but we knew he placed very high in the finals. We found out today just how highly he placed -- First Runner Up. So if someone dropped out for any reason, Julian would be next to go.

Which is why the Asia Society called today -- to see if Julian was still interested in going -- to China this summer.

China.

This Summer!

We're still working out the details, but it looks tentatively like he'll be gone July 1st - 23rd. So posts might be a bit thin for me for a while -- I've got to come up with $700.00 pronto for the trip.

~~JD~~


PS: China!!!

Nineteen Years and Counting

May 28th, 1988 -- this gorgeous woman married the likes of me. Lucky, lucky me.

Julian says "Yaaaay!"

~~JD~~

Happy Memorial Day

Two Videos which are really resonating around my brain at the moment:





This first one in particular resonates because my 12-greats grandfather, Christopher Long, was General Washington's color-bearer throughout the Revolutionary War (i.e., he carried the American Flag for Washington's troops.) With Faith Hill singing the Star Spangled Banner behind it, you can't go wrong.




This second one is an interview with Robert Mitchum in 1966 about the Vietnam War. Hear the words of a man who lived through the last war we won -- we haven't "won" a war since his generation fought World War II.

And If I need to apologize for the cigarette smoke or the frank brutal reality of the quotes, then you really need to focus a bit more.

~~JD~~

Friday Night, 2.6 Miles

Samantha the Wonder Dog; Doing what she does best.


Mileage 5/25: 2.6

AM Glucose (5/27): 102*
AM Glucose (5/26): 99*
AM Glucose (5/25): 88
AM Glucose (5/24): 72
AM Glucose (5/23): 92
AM Glucose (5/22): 99*
AM Glucose (5/21): 68
AM Glucose (5/20): 79
AM Glucose (5/19): 74
AM Glucose (5/17): 57
AM Glucose (5/16): 57

Today's Weight: 291.5
Weight Loss: 34.5 pounds


That little bit of rebound on the weight (1.5 pounds) was kind of expected -- I lost almost 10 pounds in 8 days there, so I'm not too worried about it.

When i started having those ultra-low blood sugars in the fifties the middle of the month, I started thinking about doing things different, like changing my eating habits (adding a nightime snack, etc.) Starting the 19th, though, I began to see a noticeable difference in the blood sugars. It took a few more days until I realized I had put the wrong strength medication in my medicine boxes. (I usually take 10 mg of glyburide at night and 5mg in the morning -- I had accidentally put 5mg in both boxes.)

In other words, I've cut my dose of diabetic meds by 1/3rd. That's a really good thing!

Additionally, the starred dates (5/22, 5/26, & 5/27) are days I forgot to take my nighttime medications entirely. (It's easy to determine -- if the pills are still in the box when I wake up in the morning, I didn't take them, did I?) This would mean that apparently I can cut my dose of diabetic meds by 2/3rds with no apparent ill effects.

I can't wait to see my Hemoglobin A1C test in September. But I'm not completely silly. I'll continue to monitor this with only cutting the 1 pill, and wait for the doctor to tell me to cut the 2nd.

But still, this is good! A couple more pounds and I might even be able to get off the meds entirely. An other good motivator for me to lay off the Klondike bars and hit the road walkin'.

Off we go!

~~JD~~

Happy John Wayne's Birthday

From WIKIPEDIA:

"Born Marion Robert Morrison and later changed to Marion Michael Morrison in Winterset, Iowa on May 26th 1907, popularly known as the 'The Duke,' he was an iconic, Academy Award-winning, American film actor. He epitomized rugged individualistic masculinity, and has become an enduring American icon. He is famous for his distinctive voice, walk and height.

In 1999, the American Film Institute named Wayne thirteenth among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time. A Harris Poll released in 2007 placed Wayne third among America's favorite film stars, the only deceased star on the list and the only one who has appeared on the poll every year."

And almost every single one of his films are set in South Texas -- with the one notable exception of The Quiet Man, which is set in the one locale with more ornery fighters than south Texas -- Ireland.

Happy Birthday, Duke. God Bless John Wayne.

~~JD~~

No, I didn't forget . . .

May 23rd is always a little hard for me.


Yesterday was Nana's 101st birthday.

~~JD~~

Diabetes Update

For some odd reason, this picture reminds me of Samantha and I walking along. For some reason. . . .


Mileage 5/22: 2.7

Mileage 5/19: 2.6
Mileage 5/17: 1.2

AM Glucose (5/23): 92
AM Glucose (5/22): 99
AM Glucose (5/21): 68
AM Glucose (5/20): 79
AM Glucose (5/19): 74
AM Glucose (5/17): 57
AM Glucose (5/16): 57

Today's Weight: 290
Weight Loss: 36 pounds


Keeping that morning blood sugar low seems to be the key. I started an evening shift last week in preparation for classes next fall (It's so much easier to get classes during the day versus Evening classes, which are almost always filled up.) The first two days I was waking up with extremely low blood sugars ("57" is actually borderline dangerous). I think this is because I was working until 11pm, then going to bed, with only my evening sandwich and yogurt to support my metabolism. And given my size and decrease eating at night (Hey, I'm working right up to bedtime almost!) resulted in low blood sugars. So I've started carrying a little snack with some kind of carbohydrate base to it, like a Nutri-Grain bar or Peanut butter sandwich to eat before bed (hopefully on the way home.)

The large weight loss (Eight pounds in ten days) is partly from that, and some from switching scales. Coming to work at 2:00 pm means I can't weigh myself first thing in the morning like I used to, so I bought a digital scale that seems to be within a pound or two (probably two) of the scale at work.

So maybe two pounds of it is scale-switching. But not all of it.

In related news, the new belt I bought in January because all of my other belts were too big -- is now too big itself. Plus Ariane has informed me that my too-big pants look like those of my beloved Bozo the Clown's pants now, so we have to go shopping at the Dickies Outlet this weekend in San Marcos for new pants.

Cool!

~~JD~~

Flurfy the Norwegian Forest Cat is Sailing the Fjords . . .

Flurfy died this morning at 9am. That makes three cats in just over five months. We've avoided the contam- inated cat foods, and none of the younger cats are sick, so this just seems to be old age catching up to them at once (they were all 18 to 19 years old.)

As you can imagine, Ariane is pretty broken up about this. I'm not doing so well myself.

If you need to refresh your memory, you can click on the title of this post to see Flurfy's original post here.

~~JD~~

Blog Updates

A couple of new things to the old 'blog here, in my never-ending quest to make my 'blog look more and more like Homer Simpson's.

The first is a Playlist from Imeem .com, which is a lot more than just a list of songs of whatever I'm listening to today. You can double-click on the green "Play" button to actually listen to the Playlist in it's entirety (assuming you have a set of speakers and a sound card available to your computer.) Alternately, you can click any one of the single selections noted there and start listening with that particular one. And from time to time I'll be changing the playlists as well -- I've already started working on the Christmas Playlist.

And you know how I love Christmas Music . . . .


The other new item is my joining a webring, which is a collection of (somewhat) like-minded 'blogs. This webring is called the Texas Connection, and has a list of other 'blogs from Texas for your perusal.

Or in Mike Workman's case, something to do while you're pretending to work, Bubba.

Enjoy!

~~JD~~

Jimmy Olsen; Teen-aged Renaissance Man

Jimmy Olsen was not just a cub reporter and photographer in the Pre-Crisis DC Universe. He also knew the identities of every teen-aged superhero in the DCU. If you were ever a "Robin" to somebody's Batman, he knew who you were. He also knew the identities of Batgirl, Bat-Girl (all three versions), and the name of the vet who "fixed" Ace the Bat-Hound, Krypto, and Streaky the Super-cat. He was a close personal friend of both Mr. Mxyzptlk and drinking buddy to Bat-Mite, and had all the Teen Titans on Speed-Dial. He was also his own super-hero, possessing powers as Elastic Lad, Turtle, Boy, and god knows how many others. It's a small wonder he wasn't a member of the X-Men, with his mutant ability to display bizarre and terrifying superpowers at the drop of a hat. According to Wikipedia his super-identities included:

* Giant Turtle Boy (Jimmy Olsen #53 -1961)
* Elastic Lad (Jimmy Olsen #37 -1959)
* Flamebird (in the shrunken Kryptonian city of Kandor)
* Speed Demon (1956)
* Radioactive Boy
* Gorilla Boy (Jimmy Olsen #24)
* Monstrous beard growth Lad (I am not making that up)
* Telepathic Jovian Boy. (Aliens transformed him, of course, but they were apparently very stupid aliens -- any reader of the Legion knows that natives of Saturn's moon Titan are Telepathic, NOT Jovians.)
* Teenaged Wolf-Man (Jimmy Olsen #44 -1960).
* Hippie - Jimmy grew a beard and joined a Superman-hating band of hippies (Jimmy Olsen #118 -1969)
* Teen-aged Viking - Jimmy put on Viking armor and mistakenly thought he'd been transported 1000 years backward in time. (And great evidence of the brain-damage all these transformations caused, I think.)
* Doomsday (All Star Superman #4 -- Jimmy takes a serum and becomes a version of Superman's foe Doomsday. Apparently an April Fool's Prank on Superman gone horribly awry.)
* A Teen-Aged Genie
* A six-armed teenager (Teen-Aged "Spider"-Man)
* A fire-breather (Why does "Teen-Aged Circus Freak" not surprise me here?)
* A water-breather (Teen-Aged Aquaman)
* A Human Porcupine (Jimmy Olsen #65 -1962)
* A gorilla's husband (Gorilla-Boy gets married, apparently)
* Superman (On another planet, but he got upset because the civilians knew who he was. Durned temperamental super-heroes!)


His "Elastic Lad" identity earned him an Honorary membership in the Legion of Super-Heroes in the 30th Century; Even though he had more powers and identities than most of the Legion put together. This just makes my cerebellum ache thinking about the Time Paradoxes that might have resulted. In fact, there's a decent chance we can pin the Crisis on Infinite Earths, Zero Hour, and the Infinite Crisis on the Time Paradoxes resulting from a red-haired cub reporter bouncing back and forth between the twentieth and thirtieth centuries on a regular basis.

And to make matters worse, one of his Honorary Legionnaire "buddies" was Insect Queen -- Lana Lang, one of Superman's crushes from Smallville. I have always personally thought that Jimmy Olsen has a high probability of being the Love Child of Lana and Superboy after a passionate night at the prom and put up for adoption in the big city of Metropolis. So if that's true, that means the whole Legion thing meant that Jimmy was hanging with his Mom; both of them in skintight suits, which put me off the Legion until post-Crisis Continuity erased this creepy time-paradox nightmare.


Jimmy Olsen; Teen-aged Renaissance Man.

~~JD~~

Sunday Night, 3.7 Miles

I was just noticing that as of this month I've been doing this 'blog 2 & 2/3rds years. I've created 252 posts, and this year I've already done more posts (61) than I did all of last year (49) or the first year (41).

Who knew I could whine so much?

Mileage: 3.7
AM Glucose (5/13): 129
AM Glucose (5/12): 115
AM Glucose (5/11): 58
AM Glucose (5/10): 66
AM Glucose (5/09): 86
AM Glucose (5/08): 61
AM Glucose (5/07): 79
Weight Loss: 23 pounds



We took the western route today to our explored limit, then went one block beyond just for good measure. I'm claiming the extra tenth of a mile, whether it's true or not. Samantha did pretty well, considering she's still wearing her winter coat; but at least she didn't almost have a heatstroke like when we walked to he Interstate. We did have a scary moment when her collar came off in the middle of a traffic-filled street, but apparently I've trained her well -- she stayed right at my side until I could get the collar and leash back on.



Julian had the band awards dinner last night (Oh, Look -- there's my plate!) and we ate at one of the numerous Mexican restaurants in San Antonio. Julian won two gag awards for "Most Likely to be seen on a Dating Show" and "Most Likely to be seen on COPS" (heh!) He also found out he'll be First Chair in the Chamber Orchestra next year. Today he had graduation for the (voluntary) Chinese class he's been taking this year. His class average was 99.8% (100% on all tests and 98% on the Final).

Ariane's grades from this semester are still pending. I'm sure they're all A's and B's.

~~JD~~

Sunday Evening, 2.6 miles

I've been taking it easy on the walking this week, and my weight is showing it. I got as low as 304 pounds and started yo-yoing up as high as 307. However, as soon as it stops raining almost every day here I plan to start walking again 3-5 times a week again. We haven't had this much rain since the year we moved here.

I think this pretty much effectively ends the drought everyone has been worried about.

Mileage: 2.6
AM Glucose (4/30): 101
AM Glucose (5/01): 105
AM Glucose (5/02): 90
AM Glucose (5/03): 108
AM Glucose (5/04): 102
AM Glucose (5/05): 77
AM Glucose (5/06): 83
Weight Loss: 19-22 pounds

The last seven days I've been able to keep my blood sugar below 110, which is a new record, and I'm pretty tickled with it. In fact, I've been under 110 for 16 of the last 18 days; also a record. Plus there were a few cheats in there (ice cream, potato chips), so I'm learning to be careful when I cheat. That's the beauty of Type I diabetes; you can really eat any food you want, as long as it's in moderation.

Of course, when I've got my hand in that bag of chips or on the ice cream scoop, moderation be damned -- I WANT IT ALL!!!

Samantha is sitting next to one of the benefits of the extra rain. These are West Texas thistle blooms, which have big white floppy flowers the size of your palm with yellow and red centers. They'll tear the hell out of your clothes, but they're gorgeous. The vacant lot next to our apartment has about a hundred of these, which is 90 more than I've seen in the last five years combined.

Very pretty stuff.

~~JD~~

Fiesta in San Antonio

So, just for the record, Fiesta is a ten-day festival after Easter. In San Antonio, it generally leads to drunken parties, public drunkenness, and multiple call-offs from work. In fact, a fairly significant portion of the locals avoid Fiesta like the plague because of the high proportion of drunks involved.

So, I've been asking for five years, What does Fiesta commemorate? Nobody seemed to know. I asked everyone -- and I mean everyone -- at work today (all locals) what Fiesta commemorates. I was told it commemorates:

** Easter
** Jesus' Resurrection
** The Virgin of Guadalupe
** A fistfight between two Daughters of the Texas Revolution in the late 1800's
** Anheuser-Bush's first brewery in Texas
** Mexican Independence
** 12 instances of "Hell if I know!"

The correct answer is actually not too far from the "fistfight between two Daughters of the Texas Revolution in the late 1800's" answer -- Fiesta actually commemorates the victory in 1836 of General Sam Houston over Santa Ana at the battle of San Jacinto, guaranteeing Texas' Independence.

Go Figure.

~~JD~~

Another Peculiarity of Living in South Texas . . .

An interesting fact of the geology of South and West Texas is that the state more- or- less rests on a huge amojunt of rock, which makes drainage problematic.

VERY problematic -- as in dangerously so.

This is what the creekbed outside my place of employment looks like about five minutes after the rain starts falling. The level is about 4-5 times higher than normal, but you still can't see the water in the bed without walking up to the crest of the bed and looking down into it. But that's a lot of water to raise the level of the creek so fast, and it comes up very quickly.


After five to ten minutes elapsed time, we begin to see significant drainage in the creek; to the point that the creek is now visible outside of the bed. (In other wotds, you don't have to look into the bed to see water; just driving by it's obvious there's a lot of water moving through the creekbed, and fast, too. At this point it is no longer safe to attempt to cross the creekbed fords, so about 10% of the surface streets in San Antonio become impassable. Still some idiot tries it every time it rains, usually with fatal results. A lady and her graddaughter drowned in this creek in the picuture last year not 20 yards from where this picture was taken.



And after about fifteen minutes elapsed time, this is what we're staring at out the back window. Please note that the entire street paralleling the creek has disappeared (it's under three feet of rapidly moving water) as well as the driveway for those poor folks' house. They're pretty much trapped in there for a while, hoping that water doesn't come up much more.

This is also about the time we start evacuating the back parking lot so the employees' cars won't float away. Still, it beats the heck out of a "Code White" (snowed in the hospital and unable to leave) any old day.

~~~JD~~~