Author: fifteenkey (Page 71 of 95)

Like the Don Knotts character in the 1964 film, my boy dreams of being a fish. I recall seeing the film as a child and was mesmerized when the live action feature gracefully swam into animation when Mr. Limpett fell from a dock. I’m sure the meaning eluded me back then, but I found this cute dialogue about “being friends” on the Internet Movie Database:

Henry Limpet: Do you suppose that we could just be more or less friends?
Ladyfish: Friends? But wouldn’t that be more or less nothing, Limpet?

As for the incredible Mr. Daley, he has been living his dream for the past 24 hours or so as “Jaws” in his new Playstation2 game. It’s taking him a while to learn the game and at first he got frustrated as he struggled to eat a few seals, “I’m sick of seals. I want to eat people.” Yep, it’s good wholesome fun, and though I may not get to watch the plasma for awhile, nothing warms my heart more than to hear my son shout with glee, “Dad, I just ate the guy from the boat!”

Yesterday I ventured to the gym for the first time in about two months. Attendance was sparse at 3-ish when I showed up, so I had unfettered access to all the contraptions in my usual routine. After two months of slacking though, the routine was not usual. I stretched my calves as I methodically inserted the orange foam earplugs that carry noise cancelling music into my head for sixty minutes. Yeah it had been a while since I’d heard Bruce and the band fire up “My Love Will Not Let You Down” and “Prove It All Night” from NYC to commence the strenuous proceedings.

After stretching for 10 minutes or so, it was on to the abs thingy which is a bench with one of those ab roller things built in. Anyway, prior to my self-imposed stint on the DL, I could easily burn through 3 sets of 100 (25 x 4) crunches in between stops on the Nautilus circuit. Not yesterday, as crunches 251-275 and 276-300 were really tough, with 295-300 being quite brutal. On to the Stairmaster we go… Again, the two-month sabbatical cost me as I managed only 20 minutes at the 5.0 setting when pre-slacker vacation I was able to crank for 30 minutes no problemo. So, I have some hills to climb, but I’ll get there.

One thing about the gym I don’t do is spend time flexing in front of the many mirrors surrounding the exercise floor. Oh yeah, I occasionally do catch a reflection of myself while walking, and yeah, I throw myself a wink, but jeez, I’m not obsessive about it. It’s not just the muscleheads admiring their physiques either. Yesterday as I scanned the floor for something worth looking at while I did a cool-down stretch, I saw this guy really examining his triceps’! The funny thing was, this guy looked about eleven months pregnant, but he wanted to make sure his tri’s looked rock solid. On second thought though, maybe the triceps is the key muscle for reaching into the drive-through window at McDonalds.

There’s tragedy in the news again. On August 16th Mardin Amin tried to sneak a little item onboard a flight from O’Hare and unfortunately his mom was with him. As some of you may know, I do have some, um, pull in the security industry and was able to get my hands on this audio transcript of the ugly incident.

Later, at home with mom and grounded, Mr. Amin was startled when mom entered his room unannounced. Again, it wasn’t pretty. Reached by telephone, Mr. Amin insisted his mom isn’t that mad at him even though he’s remaining grounded until his September 13 court date. He sounded almost boastful and said proudly, “I have the situation well in hand.”

Woke up.
Got out of bed.
Did not a thing to my head.
Found my way downstairs and drank a cup…

From that point on, this day in the life was different than the usual Thursday, but very similar to many other days in ways that really matter. After a protein shake including soy milk, yogurt, whey, a banana and berries, Kyle and I headed West on the Mohawk Trail… destination: 1912.

Our first stop was in historic Deerfield at the Yankee Candle Shop Factory. What a cool place! We had a nice lunch at their Chandler’s Restaurant that was surprisingly good… I had the pilgrim sandwich, a traditional pairing of fresh carved turkey and sage stuffing on multigrain bread. The cranberry sauce was enjoyed on the side and it was quite nice, as was the Pepi Pinot Grigio. Pepi’s web site describes it better than I could:

Yep, it tasted just like that… I do believe Kyle thoroughly enjoyed his chicken tenders and fries chased by a large, ice cold milk. From there we entered through the Yankee Candle Museum and enjoyed a little history lesson on candle making. After that it was just a blur of Halloween stuff with some guy who looked like Voldemort (natch), a Christmas holiday village where it snowed, thousands and thousands of candles, and a Hummer dealership. OK, I made the Hummer part up, but the place was big. We scored 3 22oz’ers: Buttercream (Kyle’s fave), Ginger Citrus and Autumn Wreath for $50. I’ll tell you this, Ginger Citrus smells way better than those tallow candles of yesteryear.

As we rode South on 91 toward Springfield, Kyle was enjoying “Titanic” on his portable DVD player received last Christmas from Auntie Noreen and Uncle Kev. What he didn’t realize was that our next stop was to be at the Titanic Historical Society Museum in downtown Indian Orchard, MA. What a treat for my boy! Literally located in the back of a jewelry store, the museum is a real labor of love for the curators. There are artifacts, movie posters and many models of the infamous ship. With the audio of the 1997 self-titled film playing in the background, I watched Kyle take it all in. He chatted up the woman about Rose, Jack and even some of the people who were not Hollywood fiction. Then he saw it. “Oh, I knew they’d have the diamond!” he gleefully exclaimed upon seeing an exact replica of “Le Coeur de la Mer” (The Heart of the Ocean).

After about thirty minutes, we’d seen all of the tiny homage to history. I know it was very special for Kyle and so, it was for me. We headed home with the sun setting to our backs on a day different than the usual Thursday.

It’s official. Pluto has been shown the intergalactic door and is no longer considered a planet by the International Astronomical Union. To me, Pluto will always be the last bastion of the solar system I grew up with, and there’s no freakin way I’m snipping Pluto off the mobile in my room.

The Plutoversy has produced some interesting commentary from the rocket science set, some of whom can’t seem to um, theorize beyond their own local spinning rock. I’m sure, for example, Alan Boss, a planetary theorist at the Carnegie Institution of Washington, was speaking universally when he declared, “We have a duty to satisfy the whole world.” Really Al? What if those nasty Klingons think Pluto is a planet in their hood?

Anyway, Pluto’s demotion really pissed some people off, including NASA’s New Horizons project mission head Alan Stern, who barked, “It’s a sloppy definition. It’s bad science. It ain’t over.” Love that passion, Al (another Al?) but I think we could probably spend $700M a little more constructively than on flying to Pluto, OK? Listen, I can predict with certainty exactly what the thing will beam back to Earth when it finally gets to Pluto in ten years: “It’s f#$%ing cold here.”

Finally, since every controversy can be analogized into a battle of the sexes, Jack Horkheimer, who has a better name than either Al, and is also host of the PBS show “Star Gazer, got cute when he said, “It’s like an amicable divorce. The legal status has changed but the person really hasn’t. It’s just single again.”

Speaking of divorce, Forbes magazine has some advice for their male and lesbian readers: “Don’t Marry Career Women.” So, I agree, but only if the “career” is at KFC. Seriously, if I ever get married, or even date a woman for any length of time, she’ll have to be smart. I mean, after the otherworldly thirty seconds of sex, I want someone interesting to talk with… Smart? Yeah. Married to their career? No, thank you. After all, how’s a woman going to be a good partner if she’s constantly thumbing her blackberry?

Vacation was delayed a few days to crank out a new program to… Well, it was delayed and now I guess I’m officially on vacation. It remains to be seen if I’ll stay off work eMail given this is our critical 4th quarter.

So… what to do? Kyle is with me for the duration, although he may hang with his mom tomorrow night since she leaves on a real vacation next week. The Williamstown day trip is definitely on, perhaps tomorrow. Then there’s the MFA show I never got to and possibly a day or two down to the Cape or the Vineyard. What else? Any suggestions? Maybe some golf. That would be new.

I want my vacation to be more than just a chill. I’d like to enrich my life and experience some new things. Hmmm… How about some books. Let’s see… Here are a few I’ve purchased but not yet read:

• The Way of Zen
• The Right To Write
• Golf My Way

I’ll keep busy.

Apparently Pluto is going to be a former planet soon. Yes, it’s true. A “Planet Definition Committee” of the International Astronomical Union is meeting in Prague this week to decide the icy ball’s fate. Obviously, folks are upset, and no one more so than Pluto. I reached out to his people for this exclusive interview. Note: It was very clear right from the get-go of this interview that Pluto was very distraught and drinking heavily. It was truly heartbreaking.

Fifteenkey: “Are things better since Michael Eisner left?”

Pluto: “Hey man, Mike was dope. You noticed any Pluto features since the dude got canned?”

Fifteenkey: “Uh, sorry. From what I read, Mr. Eisner wasn’t too popular with the shareholders.”

Pluto: “Yeah, well that’s because the shareholders had blind allegiance to the board, and the board was manipulated by the main mouse.”

Fifteenkey: “Why was Mickey Mouse manipulating the board?”

Pluto: “Boy, you’re a sharp one, you are. You ever work for Bush?”

Fifteenkey: “No, I’m an independent.”

Pluto: “I see. Anyway, it was the Pixar thing. They weren’t interested in doing that computer generated shit for any of the old crew and that really frosted Mick. I remember one time we were at Jack Nicholson’s house and Mick was hammered. It was when Minnie had that thing with Goofy and Mick was hittin’ it pretty bad. At least it ended the debate about what Goofy was.”

Fifteenkey: “So what happened?”

Pluto: “You really did your homework, eh? Mick tossed a drink in Steve Jobs face and fu&^%in lost it, man. I finally was able to drag his ass out of there, but Jobs was messed up. Mick really freaked him out. His eyes were bulging and his whiskey coated screams of ‘YOU’LL NEVER WORK IN THIS TOWN AGAIN’ were chilling. I’ll never forget it.”

Fifteenkey: “Cool story. So what about this planet thing?”

Pluto: “Hollywood politics. Pure and simple.”

Fifteenkey: “I don’t get it.”

Pluto: “Yeah, I can tell, and you definitely need to. Dude, all the planets are wired ‘cept Pluto. Hey, I had my day, but somebody had to go and that somebody is me. I mean, Mercury’s f$%^ing HOT, Venus has the goddess of sex thing going. Earth? Man… Mars has scary fake Martians. Jupiter is huge and has that freaky spot thing. Saturn has rings, and I’ll admit, they’re f&^%ing cool. Neptune… I don’t know. It’s blue. What’s Pluto got?”

Fifteenkey: “What about Uranus?”

Pluto: “This interview is over.”

My brother and his family were up from Philly this weekend for a little family get-together. We had a great weekend and my kids really enjoyed their little cousin Margeaux. At one point during the weekend, my sister-in-law Noreen mentioned an article in the UK’s Guardian Online. I hadn’t read it lately, so I looked at my Bloglines RSS feeds and found this article citing how a poll of how 77% of some 2,000 British women “wanted to receive a handwritten love letter rather than a love text or email…” Incredibly, nearly 20% of these women have never received a love letter, and 44% responded that it had been over ten years since they last received one. I find that incredibly sad, but come to think of it, I haven’t written one in a while, handwritten or otherwise, and ten years passes quickly, like a mid-August rainshower.

If the time ever arrives, I’ll remember to say it the old fashioned way. Until then, the Guardian will keep me thinking about football.

Gotta love this pic of Dave in the funky-guy hat. He is one lucky dude as Graham Parker has asked the big guy to take a crack at writing the liner notes for an upcoming live record being released on Bloodshot Records. This has to be such a rock n’ roll fantasy for Dave. He’s been a long-time fan of GP and did this kick ass interview with him in June. Yep, it’s Dave’s passion that got him this gig and as he knows… Passion is no Ordinary Word.

I’ve been unable to determine the source of this excellent advice. Spanish proverb? New England proverb? I certainly have invoked it the past couple of days. I’ve been in all-day meetings with groups exploring and validating the business needs of our prospects and customers in Healthcare and Manufacturing. Of course, I know virtually nothing of those “Critical Business Issues,” but I’m very fortunate to work in a company with many very bright people, and several of these “experts” are participating in the workshops.

Unfortunately, not everyone adheres to the counsel above. Yesterday during a break I asked one of the workshop facilitators if their new book was available as an audio download. Out of nowhere, a woman I hardly knew chirped, “What’s wrong, can’t you read? Did you take the short bus?” I just turned my head and looked at her. I didn’t say anything, but maybe I didn’t have to. Now I’ve got no problem reading and I can write better than some, but let’s just say I’m a little sensitive than most to a comment like that.

Words can be so powerful. They can lift up or tear down. You just never know when one word may be the very thing someone needs to hear; or the last thing they want to hear. Words are also interpreted. You may imply one thing, but your recipient may infer something completely different. The more you know the receiver, the more you’ll understand their boundaries of appropriateness. I know if that woman knew me at all, she would have known better than to break the rule above yesterday.