Tick Tock...

Well when I last left off I was just about to dive into a plate of spaghetti with a mention of being back in a few. I guess I meant 13 hours or so. LOL. I sat myself down to watch a bit of the Tigers-Yanks game and they were in a rain delay and started channel surfing and ended up on "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives" on either the Travel Channel or the Food Network. I am not sure what station it is on. The stations are next to each other on my tv dial. LOL. Dial. We haven't those on tvs in how long? Decades I think.

Anyways one is 51 and the other is 52 on that clicker thing that Charter gave me. I am surprised they didn't charge me for that also. Ever look at your cable tv and internet bill. Uneffinbelievable the amount of fees and charges that are buried in the final amount. That bill is just as bad as my cellphone bill from Verizon. WTF are half those things that I am being charged on that bill. Fees, fees, taxes here, taxes there. Started off with a $70 plan and it ends up being over $100 when it is all said and done.

Uh oh I am cranky this morning. LOL. Guess that happens when I wake up at 419am in pain from that sciatic thing that I am going through. I was pacing from the kitchen back to my bedroom trying to loosen up my right hamstring which was completely knotted up. If I am not careful I will have worn spots on the carpet soon. LOL. Maybe I should just start walking up and down the street in the middle of the night when that happens again. Probably tonight the way things are going lately.

Tried to get back online last night but my internet connection was wonky. I called up for help on that 1-800-GET-EFFED number on my bill and I just got more frustrated trying to get to a live person. Man oh man customer service as a rule pretty much sucks everywhere nowadays. When you call up some number and the first thing you hear is please listen to the options as our menu has changed. That is a sure sign that you are about to waste 15 20 minutes of your life pushing buttons on your phone. It is even worse if you are doing this while on a cellphone.

So anyways they reset my connection but my router wasn't working properly so I had to connect directly to my desktop. It wasn't working all that hot. I kept on getting slow and slower page loading and finally I gave up and went back to that Clive Cussler book that I am re-reading. I need to head over to a used book store to stock up on new reading material.

Wow I go off on some strange tangents sometimes. Anyways not helping my crankiness this morning is the fact that I spent my first half hour online paying bills like mortgage, property tax, cable bill, Dell, Belks, Best Buy, etc. etc. Lousy way to start a weekend. LOL.

No big plans today. Want to get the prodigal son to the barber. He needs a trim and then some. I've been bugging him about for weeks now. He thinks I am jealous. LOL. Logical reasoning on his part. O:) Gets that from his mother's side of the family. I should try to get to that used bookstore and I would like to get a pedicure. Oh gawd I just typed that online. A pedicure. That is so not me. I've never had one but given that my feet are in rough shape I figured that they could use a little bit of pampering. I'm not very good at keeping them in good shape. I just looked at them and saw my left one but can't really see my right one as Jynx/Jinx decided to park herself on that foot. She's been hanging out with me a lot lately. LOL. She must know that I buy her food and stuff. O:)

That's it for now. I need coffee number two now.

Well I And We Have Made It To Another Weekend...

There were times this week that I thought we would never get to the weekend. It's around 830pm now I have spent an hour and half or so doing some month-end work work. For the uniniated work work is my day job. Work would be my house stuff. I tend not to be too much of a work guy. I put things off an awful lot. Too late for this tiger to change his stripes I think.

So I got home, turned on my work work laptop, grabbed a beer which lasted about a minute and a half then went to pick Harrison up at his part-time job. Got back home and worked worked for an hour and a half or so.

Emptied the dishwasher. Reloaded the dishwasher. Then decided to make spaghetti for din-din even though the prodigal son isn't Hungary or hungry. I make a pretty decent sauce even though I cheat with some pre-fab tomato sauce. I do add meat, onions, garlic powder, red peppers and a couple more things when I think of looking at my spice rack thingee.

I had a classic rock station (Music Choice) playing on TV and H tried to stump me on a song or two. I surprised him some when Pete Townshend's "Let My Love Open The Door" came on. I was able to name artist, song, album and year before Petey Boy sang a word. Like I said to H, I am a fountain of useless information. Darn VH1 no longer carries Rock'n'Roll Jeopardy because I would definitely be there. Sadly Jeff Probst has gone to host Survivor. So sad.

Yes Delmon Young homered off CC Sabathia in the top of the 1st. Go Tigers. Anybody but the Yankees out of the AL. I would like to see Detroit advance. Isn't baseball amazing? Matt Moore of the TB Rays, 2nd major league start ever (EVER) holds the Rangers to 2 hits 2 walks in 7 innings. He pulled a Dryden. LOL. I am crossing sports but I think most would miss the reference.

Time to eat. Back in a few....

Posting While On My Knees...

This is bad. I am typing while on my knees because I am in too much pain to sit like a normal person. Waiting for the pain pills to kick in. Problem with that is my knees are so bony that within seconds I am not very comfortable.

I am listening to the late Irishman Gary Moore playing "Parisienne Walkways" at a Phil Lynott tribute show in Dublin. What an incredible guitar player he was! The world lost a true talent in February of this year. Listening to Gary Moore play is so soothing. Seeing him play is something. The range of faces that he made is incredible. It is almost as if he was in pain and all of sudden in joy. Incredible player. A man that many are not in the know of I think. Kind of sad.

Anyways onto more pleasant things. I left work about a half hour early to go to the Fairview Corners Post Office before it closed. I have registered lettermail from the IRS. That can't be good. LOL. So I leave work early after checking to see what time it closed at online. I thought it was 5 which isn't that convenient. Turns out it is 430. That is even more inconvenient. I wonder why they get so much negative press. LOL. Bachmann. Perry. USPS. Cantaloupes. Hmmmm. Which one gets razzed the most. Probably a toss up. Now I have to figure when I can get to the post office. It won't be tomorrow as I have an Excel 2010 class to take. I probably did not plan that too well. Well it was a Schlewing move. O:)

So in Schlewing's World today is a sad day. This is it for the regular season in MLB unless possible tiebreakers count that may be played tomorrow. Given that my Nats are not playing tomorrow it doesn't count then. My blog my reasoning so there!!! LOL. I love to laugh when I write something that amuses me. Okay sometimes it doesn't take much to amuse me. Is that such a bad thing? I think not.

I have to get my printer hooked up to this desktop. I have tons of pictures that I want to blog on. Lots of memories. Good ones. Seeing pictures triggers good things in my world. In some ways I have had a blessed life. That may not be a Marc word (blessed). It worked there though. In other ways, my life has sucked. That isn't a bad thing necessarily. Having a bad or sad experience often can be used to compare to a good, happy or joyful experience. If you don't have a bad or sad experience how does one measure good or glad? The key I think is that the not so good is not self-inflicted because if it is who else but oneself can be blamed. Dang I may have to erase a couple of sentences here as I am getting too maudlin. LOL. That isn't me.

Okay that's it for now. I need to do stuff before I get H at school. It's trivia night. It used be lots of fun. It isn't the same anymore. The crowd has changed. The music isn't all that good. The quizmaster. Hmmmm. Less said better it is. LOL. Okay roger out. Go Nats. 2012 will be a good year!

Damn Another Blog Today!!!

Okay I have had a few today, tonight! Whatever!! It seems that I am still coherent enough to blog as I just read a headline that pissed me off.

What the eff is what with journalism nowadays that they scream headlines for non-story? Case in point is Michael Vick. That pillar of society! Headline reads "Hit the snooze button on this dream team!"

How did the 2011 Philadelphia Eagles all of a sudden become "Dream Team" status? Was it because of pre-season games? Was it because on paper they looked decent? Surely it wasn't because of Amdy Reid's track record? I sure hope it wasn't due to PETA's best friend! Oh the story came from Fox Sports. Damn I was giving them journalistic credentials. Sorry Angie and Tom. This is a dream team that never was.

Democrats and Libertarians - Consensus No Chance

Okay this is bad! I'm sitting at my computer reading news stories, listening to music and sweating. Geezus I have become a sweat monster. It isn't that warm in the house and I have the ceiling fan in my room going full blast yet I can feel the sweat dripping. LOL. Okay don't picture that please! It isn't pretty.

However this little blog is about a conversation I had with a couple guys this week. I probably would have been a bit more effective in my arguments if I had not had a couple of beers but here goes the recap regardless. LOL.

So I met up with a couple of guys that are libertarians. They are no doubt Ron Paul disciples. They have me scared actually that this individual centred thinking can become more prevalent in our society. I am of the mind that we should try to help out those that are less fortunate and those that have less even if it means that we forego some of our own hard-earned gains. It seems to me that their attitude is "what's mine is mine, don't touch, don't think about it and I am not sharing any of it". They kept on bringing up people that are getting unemployment and food stamps as if this was an enviable place to be in. They kept on referring to them as takers.

They love to blab on about the 5 or 10% richest in our society paying 70% or 90% of all taxes. It is such a ridiculous argument. If one makes $1,000,000 and pays $200,000 are they not better off than someone that makes $50,000 and pays $10,000 or something like that? Their argument is all about self-centredness. Sad.

Then they go on and on about taxes increasing all the time. They have absolute no field of reference. Try comparing your taxes here to what one pays in Canada or in Europe and then come back to me with that argument. LOL.

It makes me think of a certain individual that spends his day writing comments on the Greenville News website. His only argument is that liberals are this, liberal are that ad infinium. I once commented on that and he came back and offered more name-calling in his argument. It's like what's the point. They will never see the light from their caves.

Meanderings In My Head...

So last night I headed downtown to Main Street Fridays and met up with my buddy from back home. I decided as I was driving on 385 to take the Laurens Rd. exit and come up via Richardson St. to get to the free parking lot. Unfortunately with my sense of direction; it didn't exactly work out that way. LOL. I really have no sense of direction. I am not even sure if Richardson crosses Laurens or Stone Rd. I know that Main St. does. Perhaps I was supposed to take that street to get to or near Richardson. I did manage to get there but it took me an extra 10 minutes.

Last night was probably the last time I'm heading down to Main St. Fridays this year as their season is ending next Friday. The bands that they have had the last couple times I have been have not been that great. Both of the them were 60s-70s beach music bands and the repertoires were quite similar. For some reason K.C. and the Sunshine Band's "Boogie Shoes" is real popular down here. I don't get the attraction at all. I remember K.C being real popular on AM radio (CKGM back in Montreal) but "Boogie Shoes" was not one of the songs that they played. If they did it was immediately forgettable as I don't remember it.

Lots of people downtown last night. Young and old. Great for people watching. The nice thing is that at 9pm it is still super comfortable to be outside.

Heading back home around 9pm or so last night. Didn't do the usual eat out thing. I headed to the Zone for a couple of beers and bumped into the St. Louis Cardinal fan that I had been talking with on Wednesday night after trivia. On Wednesday things were looking good for the Cards in their chase for the wild card slot in the NL. By about 1030pm yesterday that had changed for the worst.

Firstly they blew a 6-2 9th inning lead on Thursday to the lowly Mets. So instead of being 1 game out they were two games. Then last night they lost to the Cubbies while the Braves beat my Nationals. That brought their deficit to 3 games with 5 to play. Luckily for them the Nats won earlier today as Chien-Ming Wang pitched a great game and Carlos Marmol self-destructed in the 9th inning against the Cards. Braves lead is back down to 2 games with 4 games to go. It will make for some scoreboard watching.

It's Sunday morning now as I type. I kind of forgot about the meanderings yesterday afternoon. LOL. I have to ask a question now. Not that I am expecting any answers. But what gives with neck tattoos? Who decided these things look cool? Yesterday I saw Yadier Molina (Cards catcher) at the plate and he had these tattoos on the back side of his neck. Not sure what they were. Not that it really makes a difference. I wonder what that will look like when he is 75 yrs. old? Kind of a like a woman getting something on her boobs I guess. Unless of course the picture gets clearer as gravity goes. LOL. Tattoo technology.

What's on the agenda today? I have to shave. I look like crap. More hair on my face than on my head. Now that isn't much of an accomplishment mind you. Just stating facts. Going to do some work work. Going to do some laundry. Going to grill some chicken for supper tonight. Going to have more coffee! LOL. That is the first thing I am going to do. More coffee!

Best Intentions

So when I left the office tonight I had the best intentions to do this and do that. Well I got home and to paraphase a Pink Floyd song I decided "not now John, fuck all that, I gotta get to a trivia show." Like I said I paraphased somewhat.

Actually before trivia I have to get the young man aka H at GTech where is taking a calculus class tonight. Then I am off to trivia at the Zone. My hump day or evening reward.

What's on my mind? Hmmm. Well I got angry while driving today. Big surprise there. Not! Though today it just seemed worse than usual and that's saying something. I saw an idiot of the young male variety go from the outside lane on the left clear across two lanes to the right as if he was playing snakes and ladders as opposed to driving a car. This occurred on Pleasantburg as I was dropping H off at school at lunchtime.

Then on my way back to the office some young lady who may be related to Palin or Bachmann given the lack of common sense decided to cut across three lanes of traffic from left to right. In a normal world you move from one lane to another. In her effed up imaginary I'm an idiot world what she did was acceptable behaviour.

I just shake my head at times and wonder how shallow is the gene pool down here.

The best one though occured as I was driving H to school on Laurens and a lady at the age of collecting her pension decided to be on the road at the same time as other humanoids.

Picture the scene. Laurens Rd. Rainy misty day. 3 lanes going southbound. 3 lanes northbound. Lane in the middle is a turning lane. This lane is almost 2 cars wide. We're talking a big street. In a trendy place, this would be a boulevard. Here it is Friday night at demolition derby. LOL.

On the roads here I tend not to follow too closely. Other drivers scare the eff out of me. So I'm driving around 45 in the left lane. The speed limit and I am in the correct lane I would think. The Golden Girl in front of me decides that she needs to turn into some strip mall on the left on Laurens. So in her and I use the term loosely mind she decides to slow down to 20mph in the left lane. Then she decides she is going to go into the turning. So here I am behind her and all of a sudden I have to drop speed in half so that I can accomodate whatever thought crossed her mind. So she goes into the turning lane and then notices there is a car stopped to turn to their left in the opposite direction about 40-50 ft. away. So what does she decide to do? Come back into my lane no signal no care in the world because the brain activity is barely registering. I slam on my brakes, bang on the horn and give her the bright lights treatment all the while almost having a nervous breakdown dealing with this accident waiting to happen. Even H took my side there and he rarely does as he thinks all licensed Schlewing drivers have anger management issues. He's probably right. LOL. As I passed her I looked at her and saw a zombie. I'm sure she is one. No doubt about. She was in George Romero's movies. LOL.

Anyways that's it for now. I will be back later to blog perhaps. I have lots of thoughts on other things that amused as well as what the effed me today...

I think the clip art I used is perfect for being on the roads in Greenville and Simpsonville today O:)

Long Day

So you ever notice how some days just seem longer than others? Today was one of those for me. Up and at 'em at 430am for some reason. I'm stressed out a bit I am sure. There are days that I am just waiting for that other shoe to drop and then I am effed or will be effed.

For lack of a better example in symbolism I get that vision of a hamster on that wheel that you often see in their cage. I upgraded that vision to a hamster as there is no way I'm a rat.

So I was up way too early on too little sleep trying to play catch up on work stuff. I really suck at using my time effectively. Okay that isn't the nicest verbage but on 4.5 hours of sleep I just don't think I am too verbose.

I knew I had chauffeur duties for H at 715am, 11am and 10pm today plus a full day's work and trying to meet my objectives for my weekly one on one. Just too many things that I had to do. Fortunately my one on one was pushed back to the end of the day which allowed me to be better prepared and take care of some other work things.

I pass by one of my banks and realize darn I didn't bring my chequebook and car payment thingee. Just another thing I need to remember for tomorrow. I know I will now as I put all of that next to my money stash. Okay it isn't quite a stash. LOL. I found the car payment thingee. Now I need to find my chequebook. I am a walking lost and lost and found department. Yes I meant to double up on the lost part.

I need to set up the time to get myself to an optometrist. I definitely need a new prescription. Everything is blurry it seems with these glasses. Schlewings tend to be tall as a rule which is a good thing but our vision absolutely sucks.

Dang, effed, effed, sucks and sucks; I'm thinking that a Nobel Prize for Literature is not in my near future!

Cool song. Frankie Goes to Hollywood on a mix CD with "Welcome To The Pleasure Dome". I love this song. No clue what it means. "The animals are winding up". WTF are they watches? Are they pitching off a mound? "Shooting stars never stop even when they reach the top". Top of what? Hill? Bill? Window Sill? Someone help me and explain this song to me. Please pretty please. LOL. Okay I know it makes no sense. That's okay it has a great beat!

So what else happened today? Our governor Nikki Haley admitted she was wrong. LOL. That should be a daily occurence actually amd twice on Sundays! What was she wrong about? Well a little while back she stated that half of the applicants for jobs at a nuclear plant facility failed their drug tests. What can one say about that statement without being sued for slanderous commentary? Actually whatever I would type could not be considered slanderous given the total lack of intelligence that was used in uttering that statement. Her defense was someone on her team told her this. Well it must be fact then. Effin Einstein. I am so proud that she is there in the corridors of power defending my interests. Can you detect sarcasm there? Gawd I sure hope so.

On a more pleasant note my Expos / Nats won in the first game of revenue-grab doubleheader by scoring a run in the top of the 10th. Drew Storen picked up his 39th save. Roger Bernandina hit a 3-run homer. I would love to see what this guy could do in a full year of ABs. His numbers aren't terrible. .245 BA, .307 OBP. 16SB 2CS. Pretty solid numbers as a 4th outfielder. He does need to cut down on the KOs though. After all who do we have in the outfield? The Beast (Morse) and the Rich Dude (Werth). Roger Dodger fits there perhaps if the rich man is in CF. At least until Bryce Harper is ready for the show in 2013. Why the heck not?

Okay enough typing for now. Time for din-din. Penne Pasta with hot Italian sausage in a white sauce. Yum.

Argh It's Still Monday

So I have a theory about Mondays. There is nothing good that ever happens on a Monday. Okay it isn't like I have all kinds of empirical data to back this up but I strongly feel that Mondays effing suck. I think that because of this one should never ever make any decisions of consequence on Monday because the wiring in one's brain is just not functioning correctly.

Earlier today I was talking with one of my colleagues who is involved in this scanning and electronic data project that we were both assigned to work on. She mentioned to me that she needs to go back to Ohio in three weeks for her niece's after the wedding wedding reception. Yes I know I put wedding twice in that sentence. It makes perfect sense even though it isn't nice to look at. Her niece is getting married the week before in Colorado and will have a wedding reception there but then she will have another a week later for the people that can't make it to the Colorado event. LOL. Complicated huh.

Anyways back to the Monday effing sucks theory; she then told me that she has to go to the Ohio reception even though she will be going to the Colorado event the week before. The reason that she has to do this is to meet up with her brothers to pre-plan their mother's funeral arrangements because her mother's health has taken a serious turn for the worse. Her eyes started tearing up as she told me that and then my eyes started tearing up as well.

When her Mother lived in Greenville, I would take the two of them for breakfast every once in a while so that they could get out of the house on the weekends. Her mother had suffered a stroke and was no longer able to drive and they were dependent on friends to get out and about. Her Mother loved or loves IHOP so on the odd Sunday mornings we would head over to the IHOP location on Wade Hampton. We would always make sure that we would go there while most people were at church to ensure that we would be able to get a seat right away at the restaurant. IHOP breakfast plates are massive and her tiny Mom would devour all of it. She would out-eat me. LOL.

Sunday brunch time here in Greenville after church services makes me think of Friday nights way back when on Crescent Street. Line-ups everywhere to get inside a bar. Here we get the line-ups after the 2nd church service on Sundays. I think that per capita the most sweet and unsweet tea is consumed in restaurants in Greenville, SC between 11am-1pm every Sunday of the month. LOL.

So back to my theory. More bad news on a Monday. Quelle surprise! What a surprise! A little over 9 years ago I found out on a Monday evening that my Mom had suffered a massive heart attack and that I needed to get myself up to Nova Scotia where she was living to say goodbye. I remember that phone call as if it happened yesterday.

So I don't have much back-up for my theory but I'm standing by my findings. Give me all of the other days of the week and y'all can keep your Mondays to yourself!!!

Hockey On Its' Way...

So in between watching the Rays-Red Sox game on TBS, the Mets-Braves game on SportsSouth and the Panthers-Packers game on Fox; I started reading some stories on the upcoming hockey season.

Sadly the first story I read about was about the funeral service held yesterday in the Detroit area for the ex-assistant coach of the Red Wings. Like many a hockey fan I was in shock the day that the deadly plane crash occurred. Reading the names of those that passed in that tragic accident made me think even more how fleeting life can be. I can't pretend that I knew any of the people on that flight. I had seen several play hockey on TV or live. I had seen Brad McCrimmon play and coach. I had seen Pavol Demitra in the last Olympics. I had seen and heard of many of the other players that perished in that flight. When you read of the ages of these people it just makes you think. A few months ago, Brad McCrimmon was behind the bench and Ruslan Salei was on the ice as the Red Wings were trying to extend their conference semi-final series against the Sharks. Less than four months after, they and others passed in a tragic accident. I think there is a lesson of sorts to be learned there by us. Be thankful, be grateful and be happy.

I then read about an open practice that the returning Winnipeg Jets had yesterday afternoon at the practice facility. it's great to hear and read about a team that has relocated to hockey country. Maybe now the NHL will understand that hockey south of the Mason-Dixon line is a tough sell. After all this is the 2nd time an Atlanta franchise has had to move north of the border. I've been to Atlanta to see games in the last couple of years including games with my Habs, with the Red Wings as well as with the Maple Leafs and for all of those games plenty of seats were available and the visiting team fans easily outnumbered the Atlanta Thrashers fans. It almost seemed like the fans were more interested in the contests being run at commercial breaks and intermissions than being at a hockey game. The Thrasher ownership didn't help matters much either though. Made me think of the Brochu and Loria years with the Expos. Oh well I am sure that the Winterpeggers will love their team. They do have some decent hockey players. December 17th will be a special night. Teemu Selanne and the Ducks will be in town. Pretty damn sure that the rafters will be rocking that night. I just saw that the Jets are playing in the Southeast Division of the Eastern Conference. About the only time that Winnipeg feels southeast is the 3-4 weeks in the middle of the summer. Rest of the time it probably feels like the Arctic tundra.

Now what about my Habs? Did they make the changes that will bring them deep into the hockey playoffs? Will the old Scott Gomez come back to the rink or will it be the older Gomez that has lost his touch? Have the Habs continued in that tradition of getting players that are quickly getting to the other side of their prime? Is the 32 yr. old Erik Cole the same player that totally took over games when he was with the Hurricanes versus the Habs a few years ago? Or will he be like the Denis Savard that we got from Chicago years ago? Is Andrei Markov going to be there for most of the season? Will the coaching staff give the ice time and freedom to the Lars Eller that showed up in the playoffs? Will the coaching staff give lots of power play time to a young gun like Yannick Webber? What about the physicality of Alexia Yemelin? Will he be given a chance to play regular minutes ahead of some of the older guys? There aren't many other intimidating players on the roster. There are tons of questions to be answered I think. The road to the Stanley Cup finals in our conference looks to be running through Boston and Philadelphia.

Less than a month til the season starts...