Somewhere in Between

That’s right.  Just got back from a weekend in Sam’s Town in honor of Matt’s upcoming nuptuals.  I guess as far as Vegas bachelor parties go we were pretty tame.  Pretty much a bunch of married or almost married guys drinking heavily, gambling a lot, and talking about life, sports, and Robocop (yeah, that’s right…robocop)

We stayed at Planet Hollywood which was fantastic!  I’ve only been to Vegas one other time, but from what I have seen of the other casinos on the strip PH is right up there with the best.   There were 8 of us in the Back to the Future II Suite which never stopped being awesome to me.  We had all kinds of random stuff from the movie decorating our suite including hoverboards, costumes, and props from the best Back to the Future of the 3 in my opinion.  One thing I was really dissappointed in was the lack (nary a mentioning!) of the Flux Capacitor.  I know it was somewhere in that hotel and my failure to see it in all it’s 1.21 jigawats was the major dissappointment of the weekend.  Well that and all the money I lost.  But mostly it was my failure to see the Flux Capacitor that will hang over this trip with that one-that-got-away feeling.

Oh, yeah…the money.  It could have been a lot worse, but I was still peeved to walk away from the weekend down $200.  Mostly because three separate people in our group walked to the Airport with 4 more figures in their bank account then what they showed up with!  More on that later.  I wasn’t jealous.  Well, yes I was.  BUT that’s not really the issue I have been dealing with in the wake of my poor performance.  I’m sad to say that the Varela Kiss of Death is still a looming presence in what is otherwise a terrific existence for yours truely.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the VKOD, here’s how it works.  When Richard Varela (that’s me) wants something.  When, in his heart of hearts, he truely believes something can be attained.  When he is CONFIDENT (that’s the real key) in the likelihood that whatever it is he has an opinion on is true…the oposite is what will happen.

A couple of examples.   I went to UNCW.  Not because I wanted to go to UNCW, but because I DIDN’T get into Carolina.  I had the grades.  I had the scores.  Dumber kids than me from my high school got in.  But not this guy!  Why?  Lot’s of reasons I’m sure, but the foremost being that I truely believed I was a lock to be accepted.  The same thing actually happened 7 years later  when I applied to Law School at UNC on the heels of what I thought was quality work at UNCW and a few years of real world experience under my belt.  I surely couldn’t be snubbed twice!  Alas…

The VKOD basically is that when I want something badly enough and subsequently have the confidence that I will get what I want.  I don’t get it.  Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not complaining.  I just thought the VKOD was vanishing into obscurity.  Between marrying a girl as wonderful as Pam, getting a job I actually like, and a number of other positive results for your boy in the game of life I was sure the VKOD had moved on to another poor soul. 

Well, then I hit the Blackjack table.  See the first time I went to Vegas I was very unprepared for gambling and was thusly punished for not respecting the table.  I didn’t learn the rules before sitting down.  I did stupid things.  I lost a lot of money.  I even had trouble doing the math quickly which led to this exchange:

(Cards are dealt and I have 13 against a dealer 7)

Me: Hit (it’s another 3), Hit (Ace), Hit (9)

(with a straight face like I am concentrating on my next move) Stay.

Dealer: You already busted.

Me:  Oh yeah, I knew that.  I was just testing you.  Good work!  Now punch me in the face as hard as you can and I will be on my way.

You get the picture.  ANYWAY I was not going to let that happen again, so I have been studying my blackjack.  I had been playing it on my phone, studying odds, and talking to more experienced players about techniques.  I was ready!  But worse…I was confident.  I thought if I played the right way there was no WAY I could lose.  I figured the worst case scenario was going to be that I log a couple of marathon sessions at the tables, crack jokes with the boys, drink the complimentary vodka, and possibly walk away from the table after a couple of hours at break even or just slightly down.

One of the big problems with the VKOD is that it’s too smart for me.  I can’t reverse it by saying I feel differently than I actually do to throw it off the scent.  So if I had tried to combat the VKOD by saying I wasn’t sure about gambling and that I wasn’t planning on winning I would have, of course, been lying to the VKOD and possibly causing it to further incur it’s wrath!  I didn’t tempt it, but it got me anyway.

I walked down the the tables with Chris and Matt with the confidence of a Matador and promptly lost $100 before I even got my second drink.  Yipes.  I made a mini-comeback during that session and ended up coming out of it relatively unscathed, but without logging the hours at the table I had planned on.  We didn’t even make it an hour at that table but I didn’t want to risk it when the dealer who had just given me some of my money back switched out with some lady that looked like what I can only best describe as a PirateNinja.  I can’t explain what that means really, but I think we can agree you don’t want to play against one in Blackjack.

So we were out of there.  We had other stuff to go do that night so there wasn’t anymore blackjack until the next day, and at that point I was poised to strike!  Riding the confidence that got me through my comeback I sat down prepared to win.  I brought $175 (I was only down $25 at this point and $200 was the limit I set for myself) and I told myself I wasn’t going to get up until that money turned into $1000.  And the crazy thing is…I almost had it. 

I have a feeling I’m going to have nightmares about the number 11 for years and years.  Or at least until my next Vegas trip.  I was up.  I was up pretty big, but not quite to my goal.  And it happened.  I was increasing my bets little by little which is how I got up, but a couple of bad hands saw the dealer chipping away at me.  After a few up and down series I hit 11 against a 6 and doubled down.  Dealer blackjack against a 17 for me.  A couple of hands later I hit 11 again.  Against a 2!  Double down.  I hit 19.  Dealer hits 20.  I hit 11 four other times against weak dealer hands, doubled down each time, and lost EVERY ONE OF THEM!  I wonder what the odds are of something like that happening.  I’m gonna say pretty slim, but the VKOD came through BIG TIME on that one.

I left the table shaking my head, but in my battle with the VKOD I will NEVER surrender.  “We will not go quietly into the night.  We will not give up without a fight!”

On to the winners.  Eric had to get back home to his new baby boy and his lovely wife but he got a 24 hour pass to come out there for the first night.  And boy did he.  Eric was in a cab to McCarran airport on Saturday morning with $1300 more than he showed up with thanks mainly to a video roulette machine.  Yes.  A video roulette machine.  Whatever Eric has is the polar opposite of the VKOD and he has been using it to his advantage his whole life.  It came through once again.  Maybe he and I are some kind of cosmic force that was separated at the creation of the universe and now we’re best friends because our opposing states of being are somehow attracted to each other like a magnet.  That’s for another blog though.

Scotty sat down at a blackjack table long after I had given up on it, and made $1000 in about an hour.  He was betting big, but he was getting the cards.  Well done.

Mitch is the story of the weekend though.  There was a point on Saturday night when he was down $2000 and sporting the not-sure-if-I-will-still-be-married-when-I-get-home face.  I had never seen him so visibly upset about anything.  Well, in an unprecedented display of softball shaped cohones, Mitch walked to the roulette wheel.

Mitch: What do you think?  I’m gonna put $2000 down on Red or Black.

Me:  WEll, that’s insane, but if I have learned anything from Wesley Snipes in my life it’s to always bet on Black.

Mitch:  I’m going red.

The wheel spins…………and spins………..and spins…………..

bounce, bounce bounce….RED!

The color returned to MItch’s face as we cheered.  The VKOD was poised to strike.  But Mitch countered it.  And defeated it.  I’m just glad someone did.

Hey everyone (no one?). I don’t think anyone checks this anymore, but a good friend of mine who is currently living (not by choice) in Pakistan requested the blog be updated because he enjoys it. What kind of guy would I be if I couldn’t entertain such a request from someone trying to make our world a safer place?

I’m in New Haven, CT right now all set to fly back to Jacksonville tomorrow morning. Well, my flight out of CT takes off early as hell, but I don’t get to Jacksonville until about 3 in the afternoon. If I drove from New Haven to Jax at 100 miles per hour without stopping, I would beat myself home. Improbable as that scenario is, it doesn’t say much for the airline I am flying that they can’t get me home a little faster. Even if everything goes right tomorrow my 8 hours of traveling will still be the mustard atop this turd sandwich, but let’s face it. This turd isn’t even ripe yet! I have a feeling I am in for more fireworks.

It’s my own fault. I knew before I even clicked the mouse to book this trip that it was doomed. I made my first critical error right at the outset, but being an optimist I thought THIS time would be different. I put my fate in the hands of the biggest bunch of amateurs in air travel today: U-S-Airways. Seriously, there should be some kind of disclaimer when you book a flight with them that says something along the lines of “Yeah, it’s cheap, but we don’t care if you get where you need to go or if you are comfortable. Trust us. We REALLY don’t care. Actually, we hate you!” At least then it wouldn’t be so appalling once they start in with their bullcrap.

When my Tuesday began at 5am I was looking forward to an early flight into Philly followed by a short hop to New Haven, putting me there at 10:30am ready for a meeting and lunch with a customer. Did. Not. Happen.

First my 615am flight out of Jacksonville was grounded due to mechanical problems. Apparently when only 5 people board a flight US Air’s planes get sick and you have step back off the plane. Coincidentally the plane wasn’t fixed until it was time for the already scheduled 10:30am flight to board. Mechanical problems can be so convenient. They even had the audacity to walk us through the same gate, onto the plane we had just gotten off of 2 hours before. Apparently the mechanical problems fixed themselves because the plane never moved and no one was visibly fixing anything.

So I settle back into my seat and who sits down next to me but the smelly hippie I had been praying wasn’t going to be next to me as I sat in the terminal watching him pick crap out of his white-guy dreadlocks. On the bright side, I found out what a person smells like when they don’t shower or use any type of hygiene products. Oh wait…that’s the opposite of the bright side. This dude was fowl. His stink was making me emotional. I kept wondering if anyone else around us could smell. Then I started wondering if anyone would back me up if I just started berating the guy and tried to force him to spend the rest of the flight in the bathroom so the rest of us could breathe. I mean, you can’t smoke on planes. If you’re too fat you have to buy two seats. Why can’t there be a smell test before you get on board? I didn’t say anything. I just turned my head into my shoulder and tried to pretend like I was sleeping while I giggled to myself about all the jokes I could make on this guy if I wasn’t such a pussy.

So we get to Philly and it really starts to go south. I only had a half hour to make my connection and salvage the day with a late afternoon meeting (rescheduled from earlier). When I look at the screen my flight is on time and at the exact opposite end of the airport from where I am. So I run to the shuttle, run to the terminal, run to my gate making it just in time to see them putting up the little CANCELED sticker under my flight number. Shoot me in the head.

I go to the counter to get another ticket, and I swear to God the 300 pound girl behind the US Airways counter actually rolled her eyes at me BEFORE I stepped up to her. This was going to be fun. She informed me my only option for New Haven would be the next day, which I was already expecting. I knew there was a flight to Albany leaving in about 2 hours and since I needed to be in Albany the next morning anyway I asked her if she could just put me on that flight. It went a little something like this:

Me: If there are seats on that flight to Albany I can just take that one?

(pause)

Tubby US Airways Counter Girl: No

Me: Why is it full?

TUACG: Uh…yeah.

Me: How do you know? You didn’t even check.

TUACG: You already booked for New Haven so…

Me: I don’t want to go to New Haven tomorrow; I want to go to Albany today. Why is this so hard.

(rolls her eyes. Sucks her teeth)

TUACG: Sir I caint help you.

Me: Great, who’s you’re boss? I want to talk to that person.

TUACG: She ain’t here right now so…

Me: Well, that sucks for you because I am going to stand here until someone either puts me on a flight to Albany or gives me a reason other than bullshit that I am not going to Albany!

(Calls manager who arrives within 30 seconds. I explain to her, and I am on a flight to Albany within 2 minutes.)

And…scene!

In a world where so many people are unemployed I find it sickening that Tubby US Airways Counter Girl is collecting a paycheck. Even if it is from the cart and donkey of air travel.

Anyhoo, I board my flight to Albany and we sit there. And sit there. And sit there. An hour goes by with no communication whatsoever. The flight attendants were hiding so they didn’t have to answer any pesky questions like “why the hell are we still on the ground when we should have been in the air 45 minutes ago?” The captain comes onto the intercom and I really wouldn’t have been surprised if he asked for volunteers to go out and give us a push. She stalls out sometimes but when we pop the clutch she gets where she needs to! Sadly it wasn’t anything that funny. We had sat for an hour because of a paperwork mixup. ONLY US AIRWAYS!

They just can’t do anything right. Their planes are crap, their flight attendants look like hell, their customer service people are rude, their flights are never on time, and they lie to their customers faces. Luckily I didn’t check any luggage but I understand they are not good at getting your bags places they are supposed to go.

I’ve spent the rest of the trip driving 30 miles an hour on a sheet of ice that used to be an interstate. The snow has been falling so rapidly the plows couldn’t even keep up. Not fun. And I still have to fly out tomorrow. Not good times. Not. Good. Times.

In case you were wondering. Thanks for all the support (MOM

Sweaty Varelas

Stud Muffin

Richard and I recently accepted the challenge to raise funds to support the Komen North Florida Race for the Cure on October 18, 2008 in their promise to save lives and end breast cancer forever by empowering people, ensuring quality of care for all and energizing science to find the cures. One in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime and the more we raise, the more the North Florida Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure can give to breast health education and screening programs in our area. Click here to visit my personal page and pledge your support. 

Not sure if you remember but Tater and I ran this race last year and had a great time. It was a really positive experience and it felt wonderful to see so many pink “survivor” t-shirts all over the place. This year Richard is joining our girl team and we are listed at the Vivacious Varelas- heeheeee!

All contributions are tax-deductible \and will fund innovative outreach and awareness programs for medically uninsured and underinsured communities in North Florida. In addition, 25% of your contribution goes to the Komen National research program. Thank you so much for your time and support in the fight against breast cancer! Every step counts!

Check back soon, we have a very busy next few weeks. Gretta,Ty and dogs move back tomorrow (wishing her a safe flight) and we are dying to see them again. OBV, I will post tons of pics. Look how cute…

I CAN’T WAit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, and we have big plans for our halloween costumes!!!! XOXO P, R & TT

Pam, Mom & Eva~Check out those jellies!

Siiiiigh

NKOTB 4-EVA

You would not believe how loud it was. Mom had her fingers in her ears the whole time, hehe.

I have not laughed that hard in a long time. It was an amazing show with some of the best girls I know.
 
Although mom and I were “tired” the next morning we spent the day getting ready to head to Gettysburg with the  horses for an overnight camping trailriding extravaganza. (This included mowing on the BIG tractor)

Mow baby, mow

Mom and Rascal

We got up early Saturday and headed up. I must say I was a little worried about the whole “camping” thing, but I had such a good time. (the wine helped) We learned a lot about the Civil War and spent some quality time in a beautiful place.

Best horse ever

Mom and Spice girl

Battleground (one of many)

History Lesson

View from the top

Old Man Dudley

Hey, It’s Richard. Ole Barack made a campaign stop here on the First Coast and we just had to get our Democracy on!  Pam’s mom is in town for her birthday (Sept 23 if you’re scoring at home), so this was a perfect activity for us on a cloudy Saturday.  Truthfully I didn’t even realize these two events were going to coincide when Claudia and I planned this secret little suprise trip behind Pam’s back, but it couldn’t have worked out any better.  If there’s one person who would be up to stand around in the heat, fight for spots in line at the Port-O-Pottys, fight for spots on the lawn, stand around, listen to a bunch of irrelevant people “warm up the crowd”, stand around, and wait, wait, wait to get a quick hello from our Donkey hero, it’s Claudia.  Here are some pics.  You can sort of tell that’s Barack standing at the podium there on the far left.  It was the best shot we could get…

Here’s the proof that we were there…

It was a great experience, and I truely felt like it was worth all the time spent fighting through crowds and dealing with smelly people getting a bit too close.  But I really wasn’t as inspired by the end of it as I thought I would be.  I mean, when Barack accepted the nomination at the DNC I got chills like 6 times during his speech.  I was expecting more of the same, but it was pretty redundant to tell the truth.  Then again, how much different stuff can someone talk about when he’s got cameras in his mix 24/7.  Pam overheard someone on her cell phone saying, “I’m at the Obama concert!” which was funny at first until he got up there.  He was playing his greatest hits!  Change.  Gonna fix Wall Street AND Main Street.  Same Health Care Congress gives itself for everyone.  America’s Great.  Mcain is a lying A-hole.  Peace.  And I’m OUT!  It was good.  I wish it were actually possible for politicians to deliver on all the promises they make.  Life would be a lot easier in this country.

So I won’t get all political on ya’ll.  I think it’s pretty obvious who we’re voting for so we can just leave it at that if you disagree.  Trust me there’s nothing you can tell me short of showing me undeniable proof that Barack is secretly the leader of some alien species of Body Snatchers trying to use the platform of President of the US to open the floodgates for the destruction of humanity that is going to change my mind, and here’s why.  Politicians, pundits, news anchors, columnists, all of them can just say whatever they want without any sort of factual basis for what’s coming out of their mouths.  So no one can possibly know what the truth actually is.  We’re basically voting for who we think is the better person.

Seriously.  If you watch the candidates go back and forth, most of what you hear out of Mcain is that Barack is going to raise everyone’s taxes.  But Barack keeps saying he’s going to cut taxes.  So anyone who wants to justify voting for Mcain can use the exact same (yet opposite) reason as people trying to justify voting for Barack and they’re both right.  It’s maddness I tell ya!  That was actually the most entertaining part of the whole speech.  The first thing Barack did was address some stuff Mcain had just said about him, saying it was all b.s. and making a few cracks back about how Mcain wants to apply the same fix to the Health Care system as he did for the Real Estate market.  And we aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaallllll know what happened to that! (Big Laugh) Oh man.  Forclosure sure can be funny when it’s at the expense of the Republicans.  So can I get my house back?  No?  OK, still not funny.

Random Notes from the Afternoon

1. People really CAN get along!  Sort of.  It got a little heated around the Port-O-Pottys when some chick tried to cut the line, but other than that everyone was very well behaved.  And we were packed in like sardines.  I’ve been to many-a-concert under simialr conditions that ended up with some seriously elevated tempers and scuffles. 

2. I’m not being a biggot, so don’t even try…but being a lesbian doesn’t make stagetory rape OK.  Got it?  There was a lesbian couple standing near us, one couldn’t have been older than 16, the other was like FORTY!  Not joking.  And the reason I know they were a COUPLE and not just a couple of lesbos enjoying the show together was because they were putting on a little show of their own.  PDA’s are not cool for anyone, and these two were particularly disgusting so it was just an all around bad deal.  Yeesh

3. You really showed Us!  There were two prop planes circling the rally for the entire 5 hours we were out there towing signs that read “Florida is Mcain/Palin Country” and “Rasing Taxes is not Patriotic”.  I’m guessing if you own your own plane you have a little money to burn, but was it really worth the $5000 you spent on gas that day to “stick it” to the Dems.  Pretty sure you didn’t change any votes fellas.  What ever happened to the days when guys with prop planes dragged positive messages about how you can get 15 towels for 12 bucks at Wings in Myrtle Beach?  Those were the good times.  Now that’s propaganda I can get with.  I mean…15 towels for 12 bucks!  You can’t beat that.

Now that all is right with the world kickball is pretty much an excuse for grown people to get together under the guise of having a purpose other than drinking and…well, drinking.  Great times.  And we get a little (and I mean a little) excersise while we’re doing it.  Afterward the whole league meets up at this place downtown and continues the party through the night, and it’s definitely all most of us are thinking about while we’re running around like a bunch of 7 year olds kicking and throwing rubber balls, and trying to catch them to hit each other with.  Here’s our team…

Blue Ballerz

Well this is some of us anyway.  There are like 11 more people on the team, but we dedicated few were the only ones that made it to our latest game.  We were simultaneously at a disadvantage in addition to having an advantage last night.  On one hand you’re allowed to field 12 people so that every inch of the field is sufficiently covered and no one has to run very much to make a play, so we didn’t have that brand strategery at our disposal.  On the other hand if you have 25 people show up to games, they all get to kick even if they are not playing in the field.  So in a 5 inning game, if all your best kickers already kicked through 2 innings, you’re pretty much screwed.  We all got to kick twice.

*Update* After our first win

We were excited, can you tell?

Now, about the game itself.  It’s a huge ego boost for me.  And yes, I realize that kickball boosting my self esteem at my age makes me a sad, sad man, but I can’t help it.  I’m not good at much, and when I actually am good at stuff it makes me feel like more of a man.  Seriously.  Anyhoo, I’m a pretty sweet kickball player.  It’s one of those in-the-land-of-the-blind-the-one-eyed-man-is-king sort of deals because I’m nothing special athletically by any stretch of the imagination.  I so, however, have 2 significant adantages over my competition. 

1. My soccer past has granted me the ability to get on base everytime.

2. I’m coordinated enough to catch the ball when it comes to me.

Like I said…nothing special.  But you’d be suprised at how much of a stud that makes me.  As you already know this league is pretty much an excuse to get together and drink a few cool ones, but we are still out there playing a game against each other. 

This creates a major internal problem for me.  I’ve been playing sports for so long I have an unhealthy competetive streak ingrained in my mind, and I have to seriously check it while I’m out there.  I’m the pitcher so  can do my best to throw people off, but in the end people are swinging at a giant, red rubber ball with their legs.  They’re going to make contact.  So the field sees a lot of action.   We’re all out there having fun, and drinking and stuff, so s@#t happens.  When someone drops an easy catch or screws up an easy out my conscious, logical thinking mind gives me the strength to smile, shrug my shoulders, and say something like “good try” or “you’ll get it next time”.  But competetive guy is in my head going “Come ON! You can’t miss such an easy catch! Geez are TRYING to loose?  What the hell?”  You know…that kind of stuff.  Yes, I have issues.  But I’m the only one that knows.  And now you.  Keep it to yourselves if you could please.

Logical Guy is able to beat Competetive Guy into submission pretty sufficiently most of the time to the point where I really am being sincere when I act like it’s not a big deal that we’re losing in kickball (because it’s not).  There’s just this one thing about Competetive Guy.  He relishes a challenge.  And he is pretty liberal about what he perceives as a direct challenge. 

So there’s this guy on the team we played last night.  He had Competetive Guy in his head too.  Only Logical Guy wasn’t around to do anything about it, so the guy was just a complete a-hole.  He was seriously acting like the evil instructor from Cobra Kai.  When one of his teammates missed an easy play, he actually yelled at them.  He was so INTENSE about it, it’s pretty hard for me to convey.  They guy’s out here yelling at his team, yelling at the umps (who were just people from another team wating for their game to start), yelling at himself…Completely ridiculous.  That would have been fine with me until he got on one of my teammates.  One of the girls on our team thought she was safe when she was called out, and said so when the ump called her out.  The guy started screaming at her to get the eff off the field in such a mean spirited way I thought for a second he was going to get in her face.  Douchebag!

Oh baby.  It…was…ON!  Nothing in the world was more important to me than beating this guy in kickball.  The rest of my team seemed to feel the same way because everyone seemed to elevate their game.  People who have never caught a ball in their lives were making plays in the field.  The only problem was we just couldn’t manufacture any runs.  It was 1-1 in the bottom of the 5th, so the best we were going to be able to do was a tie.  I was pretty dissappointed that we weren’t going to beat this a-hole because I genuinely thought he would cry if we had.  But a tie would be kind of OK, so I was still pitching screwballs and doing anything I could to make people kick poorly.  Then a funny thing happened.  2 outs.  Game on the line.  Guess who steps up to the plate?  I’m not making this up.  It truely was a Karate Kid moment for the ages. 

Now, I actually could have ended the game right there because everyone on the field knew the guy was kicking out of turn which would be an automatic out.  But like I said, the umpires were just people from another team who were undoubtedly daydreaming about all the Flip Cup they were about to be playing once they got their own game out of the way, so they didn’t notice.  Or maybe they didn’t care.  Either way I wasn’t saying anything cause I wanted a piece of this guy.  The fact that he cared enough about the outcome of this game to actually cheat made me realize that a tie would be just as bad as a loss in his eyes, and oh man did I want to make that happen?!?!

I was a little shaky at first.  I was so pumped I tried too hard to get fancy and opened with two balls.  I settled though and rolled two right accross the plate that he just watched roll by.  This dude was trying to psych me out!  Money time.  The count was 2 and 2 and if I could get one accross the plate he would have to swing.  So I put one in there and it’s not bad.  Not good, but not bad.  He made contact.  Fair ball.  Long but super high.  Easy catch for many, but you already know what we’re working with in the outfield.  So what happened?  Karma.  There we were.  2 men.  Face to face.  Not unlike each other in many ways.  The only difference being one could control his inexplicable, ridiculous lust for kickball vicotry.  The other, incapable of such self control.  Good stood against evil, and the kickball gods stepped in.  Pitch.  Kick. The ball hung for what seemed like 15 years.  Catch!  Ball game. 

Even though we tied, it got the job done.  My nemesis was PISSED.  It was probably one of the top 10 greatest things I have ever witnessed.  He went out to the parking lot and started shouting and pelting his car over and over with his ball.  As I walked by him his (soon to be ex) girlfriend was repremanding him.  I only overheard a little bit, but it was all I needed to hear.  It’s all any of us needed to hear.

“It’s effing KICKBALL!”

Relax.

And then we went to the party…

Hey everyone!  I’ve been sitting in the Charlotte airport for almost 5 hours today and I’m staring in the face of 4 more, so yeah…I’m going a little nuts right now.  Perfect time for a blog post! 

I’ve just started to get into the true function of my new job at CSX, which involves major, major movement of my ass accross the country.  I’m still getting the hang of being travel-savvy tough, and I screwed myself this time.  I had meetings in Spartanburg, SC yesterday, but by the time I had finalized my business up here it was the day before I had to leave so I had to get last minute tickets.  That meant a 6:20am flight into Charlotte by way of Atlanta yesterday, and a 7:20pm flight today that won’t get me home til around midnight after my layover. 

I can only book flights through CSX ’s corporate expedia account and I have to stay in a certain price range, which is why I was so limited.  I get overwhelmed when I feel like I am under the gun so I just took these flight times without trying to fiddle around with 1 way deals and the like.  I thought my meetings would span 2 days anyway, so it wasn’t really supposed to be that big of a deal.  Well, being the go-getter I am I was able to take care of everything yesterday leaving today free.  Thinking there would be some infinite number of flights from Charlotte to Jacksonville I strolled into the airport looking for some stand-by action around 10:30 this morning just missing the last flight that could have gotten me to Atlanta with enough time to catch an early flight back to jacksonville.  So instead of catching an early flight out, I just ended up giving back my rental car and stranding myself at the airport for 9 hours.  It’s awesome.

Currently I’m sitting in the food court next to some jackass who is apparently involved in some kind of rinky dink political campaign.  I know this because he keeps making phone call after phone call on his blue tooth, and speaking loud enough so that everyone within 35 feet of him knows he is talking buisiness.  If you have a vote in DC please don’t vote for some guy named Michael Brown.  I’m sure he’s running for Alderman or something, but if Michael Brown loses whatever he is running for it will mean this guy failed.  And that will make me happy. 

No, I can’t just move.  This is one of the only tables close enough to a power outlet for me to use my laptop.  Yes, I recognize the irony of me sitting in public on a laptop like some self-important asshole blogging about a self-important asshole talking on a bluetooth.  Gimme a break. I’m running on NO SLEEP!

Anyhoo, I didn’t check in just to bitch about the airport.  We got big things going on down here in the dirty J!  First off, we just bought Pam a new car.  A Saturn Vue, actually.  It’s totally sweet.  I’ll get a picture of it up when I get back to the house.  It took us a while, but we finally both drive grown-up cars now.  It’s a big step in our relationship as well as our status in the dirty J.  No longer will high schoolers be rolling in tighter whips than us on a regular basis.

More news on Pam…she officially quit her SUPER LAME job at Skybooks yesterday.    She starts work Monday for Sally where she will be doing actual design work and finally getting the opportunity to express herself in a job that she actually wants.  We’re both really excited.  Anyone who has had a job they loathe knows how it can manifest itself into your entire life.  It was really starting to get to her, so we’re glad she was able to find something better. Like I said…big things!

Speaking of big things Eric and I have decided to write a book.  Well, Eric decided to write a book and called me with the idea.  I love it so I am in as well.  The arrangement right now is that he’s the brains and I am the talent.  We’re gonna team up on this thing with his ideas and my brand of prose to become some sort of business writing Voltron.  It’s a very rough idea right now, so I don’t want to talk too much about it.  But basically, it’s a business book for our generation that we feel no one we’ve been exposed to has touched on.  We want it to be informative, inspirational, and funny.  So we have a hell of a task ahead of us.  Ulitmately our goal is to make this our job, but I am not doing so well right now.  I’m having trouble with the inspirado.  I have done a little here and there trying to get my ideas in order, but nothing is good yet.  We’re going to brainstorm a lot next week, so hopefully I will find it.

OK, I gotta go.  This guy is STILL TALKING ON HIS BLUETOOTH.  Yeesh.  I gotta get off this laptop so I can really look down my nose at him.

I shouldn’t really be flippant about hurricances considering the natural disaster track record over the past 5 years, but the people of Jax sure are making a big deal over something that doesn’t look very likely to affect us much.  I will say this; it DOES look really intimidating on the super doppler:

Apparently the entire Southeast is in for it.  We’re at least all going to be wet for a while anyway.  Fay has definitely caused some problems for our friends down in Southern Florida with some bad flooding in some areas, and supposedly it’s doing things that hurricanes don’t usually do.  After running over Cuba and Southern FL for a couple of days as a Tropical Storm, Fay apparently isn’t sattisfied so she’s going off the coast to gain some strength and coming for North FL and GA as a hurricane.  That’s the latest report anyway.

So we’re hunkered down in our house just watching what’s going on and enjoying our day off.  Keep your phones on though.  If you see us on the news standing on the roof of our house send help!