Monday, March 31, 2008

Good Things Come To Those Who Wait

Not a whole lot to report this week....Spring is still pretty much holding off on getting started so the bulk of the weekend was spent around the house catnapping and playing music. The BIG deal for the week happened Friday night at the Frauenthal Theatre in Muskegon and rather than repeat myself here I'm going to refer you to my music blog for the big (for me) news. Just follow this link and you should end up in the right place.
that's all for now.
TC

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

A Wintery Easter Weekend

After being in a healthy mental and physical condition most all winter, now that it's spring I've been fighting a bit of a cold the last week so that's why this is a couple days behind. I spent most of last evening wrapped up in a blanket cat napping.
Last Thursday, the 20th, was the first day of spring, but as anyone who's lived in Michigan for a year or more knows, just because the calendar says spring doesn't mean it's gotta act like it and this year was a prime example of where that cynical attitude comes from....Friday, the first full day of spring, brought us a snowstorm and about 8 more inches of the white flufffy shit. I had the day off work so I was down here in the den most of the morning piddling around. About 2:00pm I decided to go upstairs for some lunch and lo and behold it's snowing like crazy. It continued to show thru the rest of the afternoon and into the evening.
Rather than be snowed in on a Friday night w
e decided to go out to dinner with the brother-in-law and his wife and the music director of G.H. High School and his wife. We got to Red Lobster about 6:00. We had a good meal and a good time and didn't leave to head for home untlil about 9:00. By then most of the snowing had stopped but the roads were a sloppy, slippery mess all the way home.
Saturday the sun came out and started melting what had fallen the day before but there was too much around to make it all disappear in one day. We didn't do much all day but hang around the house. The high point of the day was probably getting a haircut or maybe getting the oil changed in the truck, it's a toss up.
Sunday morning I got up and made a quick breakfast for the two of us and then I got my stuff around, grabbed Mercury and headed up North to the folks house for Easter dinner. I made a stop at Big Johns store on the way up to check out some stuff I want to get for the compound this year but didn't buy anything. After a 10 minute stop there we made the rest of the trip to the folks non-stop and got there a bit after 11. They weren't home from church yet so me and Merc took a hike out in the woods.
Between 11am and about 5pm when we took off, we had a good meal of ham, sweet potatoes and rolls with Chocolate pie for desert, spent some time on the computer answering my mother's questions and spent awhile playing catch with Merc to show my dad what a good catch he was. After we said our goodbyes and took off we drove out past gramps old farm, which ain't much to look at these days and then turned the truck towards home. We got back here about 7:00 and the rest of the evening pretty much was spent taking it easy.
In other news...the American Axle strike is still going on and I'm still working so it's still a draw. So far, So good.
Not much else to say so I'll leave ya with a couple pics of my folks, one of me and Mercury and an editorial cartoon that pretty much says it all for me without saying a word. Gas prices this week are $3.38 a gallon. Talk about terrorists......


























Sunday, March 16, 2008

Spring Is In The Air

Nope, no Robins or Hyacinths yet but a lot of the snow has gone away as the last week has seen temperatures over the freezing mark every day. The weather for the coming week is more of the same......We're suppose to be having both snow and thunderstorms in the next several days so while it's not exactly motorcycle weather for me yet, it's getting close and that's a good thing.
Not much has been going on around here the last couple weeks. Been pretty quiet which is ok. I like quiet.
The biggest news I guess would be the American Axle strike, which has shut down most of GM, which in turn has shut down a lot of 3rd tier outfits, like Burnside for one. As of Friday all the production workers were laid off until the strike is over and some of the salary folks were given the time off too. I count myself lucky in that I'm one of a handful who get to go in tomorrow morning like usual and use this quiet time to try and catch up a bit. I'm hoping I can keep right on working until the strike is over, but of course there are a lot of variables involved with this situation so things could change at any time. For tomorrow at least things are still cool. I really don't want any time off right now, it would just mess the plans for the summer up all the more and I really hate dealing with the state beauracacy and unemployment. Been there, done that, way too many times.
Friday evening I got out of the house for awhile and went up to Muskegon high school where there was a drum clinic going on. Several professional drummers were there along with one local boy who made good. There were 3 kits set up on the stage, along with the rest of a band's gear. Each drummer came out to give a talk, spend sometime showing off their chops on the drums and answering questions. At the end of the evening all 3 drummers came out along with the full band and took turns trading 4's within the context of the jam. It was very cool and gave me a bit of inspiration. After it was all over I went down to ask some questions about drum tuning and I plan on taking the advice as soon as I can find a drum key around here somewhere. Like so much of my stuff around here, it seems all 3 drum keys have walked off. I feel like the borrower's are living in the walls here........
That's about it for now I guess, it's late and I need to get horizontal. If things change with the strike for better or worse I'll give out a shout.
Night.

Saturday, March 01, 2008

We've leapt into March

I was going to write somethng cute yesterday as it was the 29th day of February, the day that gets added every year to the shortest month of the year, but I nodded off before I could realize my plan. So you're going to have to suffer thru it a day late.
I don't know who's idea it was to add that bonus day to the end of February, but it had to be a mean spirited desk jockey in some govermental agency somewhere because any organization with more than a small amount of common sense would've added that day to the end of June. I mean, cmon....both July and August have 31 days so why not give June a chance at 31 days at least once every 4 years. I'd have to believe that unless you're a polar bear an added day in June to lay on the beach and swim in the lake would be a whole lot more enjoyable than another cold miserable day in February where the main form of entertainment would be to shovel the driveway, again......
Not much has happened out of the ordinary the last 3 weeks, hence the lack of an entry. The biggest news I guess is something I'd rather not talk about at the moment and I'm deferring to the old adage, some things are better left unsaid. Other that that I believe that we set some kind of record this year for the most snow ever in February. I'm not sure I got that entirely right but it wouldn't surprise me. I sure had to shovel enough of the damn stuff the last 4 weeks. Just to be fair though I have to admit that there were a couple evenings there, when I was outside, later in the evening, and the sky was clear, Full of stars and the air was cold and crisp and it felt good breathing it in and out again. Of course once you get to be 55 or so just breathing in and out feels good, even more so if you've gone thru what I went thru back in November. Coming to grips with your own mortality can really make a person sit up and take notice.
I dont have any cute jokes or videos this time to share and it's hard to drag myself out in this weather to shoot pictures so you're stuck with just text this time. Not much else to report either. Work is going good for the most part. I went in this morning for awhile to get a couple things done. We're busy right now with new work which is a good place to be in this shitty economic time. Just found out today that the city is going to rip up our road starting in April to put in new sewers, curbs, the whole nine yards. I'm going to the meeting at City Hall later this month to put in my two cents for fixing the Hopkins street curbs that I wanted fixed 20 years ago when the kids were little and couldn't ride their bikes down the sidewalk without falling off the curb. Of course as soon as they finish this project the property tax assessment will likely go up but I'll be down there to fight any increase next time because of the fact they're assessment is about 30,000 bucks over what realtors have told us it's worth. If I've got to get a bank to come out and do an official look over then I will. The money that'll cost will be returned by what I won't have to give to the city in property tax. We'll see how that one goes.
Daylight savings time starts in a week or two nowadays and I just don't think that's right. Hell, the world is still covered in 2 feet of snow and it ain't even officially Spring for 3 weeks yet. Another stupid bureaucrat came up with the idea to move the date up from the first weekend in April and for the life of me I don't know why, farmers aren't out plowing their fields this early in the season, who benefits from the change?.....damn people just can't leave well enough alone.
Anyhow, that's about it for now.....time for a nap before breakfast.